I'm confused about something: How could the mother not know that Hortense was black. When she says she's never been with anyone black, she finally remembers. Was it too shameful for her to remember or was she raped and never knew who her assailant was? I couldn't understand that part of the movie.
shareCynthia does not at first believe that Hortense can be her daughter because she can't remember ever being with a black man. It then dawns on her that she was, once. If she was raped, I don't think she would have just forgotten it! She asumed the baby belonged to one of the other men she had slept with, and she did not see the baby before it was taken away.
When Hortense asks about her father and Cynthia responds "Don't break my heart darling" it seems to me that she cannot tell Hortense anything about her dad becuase she hereself doesn't know - she barely remembered sleeping with the guy so chances are she can't even remember his name, where as Roxanne's Dad was a holiday romance who she spent time with & therefore could remember details to pass on to his daughter.
If there were anything more sinister about Hotence's conception, it would have come out - after all this is a film about a family keeping secrets from each other and those secrets coming out. When everything else was revealed at Roxanne's 21st, this would have been too if it were the case. This is also a film about a child being given up for adoption and what happens when that child seeks it's biological family. There is no mention of rape, nor is it alluded to or hinted at. To bring rape into it would have been to detract from the meaning of the film.
There is no mention of rape, nor is it alluded to or hinted at. To bring rape into it would have been to detract from the meaning of the film.
I think it is very much alluded to and hinted at, for the reasons stated earlier in the thread. If you didn't see it while others did I suspect it's more down to you than to the film (OK, it's relatively subtle). Why else would Cynthia be so distressed on the two occasions the matter is discussed? At the vague memory of a casual encounter? I don't think so. Having to admit you've forgotten sleeping with your child's father is embarrassing but not heartbreaking.
Two very plausible explanations for Cynthia's lack of recollection:- (1) repressed memory syndrome (2) Being taken advantage of while too drunk to know what was going on.
I used to want to change the world. Now I just want to leave the room with a little dignity.
Excactly:
As she sais:
"I ain't been with a black man in all my life." Because she's blocked it out. And why? It was too traumatic to remember.
And later, when Hortense asks about her father, Cynthia answers: "don't break my heart." She doesn't want to talk about it because it's too painful to remember. A very natural reaction to a rape.
**********
They blew up Congress!!!
I dunno, a rape did not suggest itself to me when I watched the film. Many people have commented that she was horribly traumatized by a rape (and possibly even was a virgin before this) and that's why she has blocked out being with Hortense's actual father but if this were the case, would she really be having sex again with someone as soon as a few weeks later (with the guy she assumed impregnated her)?
I do agree it is possible but I don't think we know enough about Cynthia to say it did happen. I think she may have been fairly promiscuous at that age and she might have also been very drunk when it happened (being drunk does not necessarily mean she did not consent). There's a good chance it was a one night stand and she didn't really know the guy - it being with a black man may not have been an issue with her at the time, only becoming important when she is faced with Hortense. If she slept with many people, she may have just forgotten rather than blocked out them memory. No doubt finding out she was pregnant would have been very traumatic and shameful (given her age and the time period) too.
Cynthia talks in quite an overly dramatic way throughout the film so when she says "don't break my heart" it could easily just mean "don't go dredging up the past" when she doesn't want to talk about that part of her life. It also must have been a massive shock to find out something you believed was the truth for over twenty years was in fact false and she is obviously still reeling from finding this out throughout the rest of the film. At first she says "I ain't been with a black man in all my life" because until that moment this was probably an incredibly minor part of her life and she is initially also in denial that Hortense is telling her the truth.
You have some very good points, Punky. And you could be right. But I still think she was raped. You question whether she would have sex again so shortly after the rape. Well, I know some girls who's turned out quite promiscuous after a rape, as a way of gaining control of their body again. After experiencing the worst kind of humiliation, you use the same ways to get back. So, no, I don't think that's unlikely.
**********
They blew up Congress!!! HAHAHA!
Yeah, I suppose rape is the type of thing that each person involved is going to react to differently. Still, when I consider Cynthia's background, personality, age, the setting of the story, etc., I still don't really think the film is trying to imply she was raped. However, I do see where the people who think she was are coming from - guess we'll have to agree to disagree. :)
share
I agree with Punky - I never took any of it to imply rape, simply because I'd consider it a modern reading of the situation.
A woman of her age would have been shunned for getting pregnant, she would have been sent away to have the kid or the couple would have had their arms twisted to get married.
I read it as a one night stand, more than likely drunk, if she had been sleeping with other guys, got pregnant and never saw the baby why would she assume it was black? Let's not forget there would have been stigma (& for some people there still is) with mixed race relationships so she would deny it and have believed it till presented with the truth.
Why else would Cynthia be so distressed on the two occasions the matter is discussed?
But instead of getting the emotional fulfillment she yearned for, what she got was a family ashamed of her, her feeling ashamed of herself, and she was forever caught in that downward spiral of shame
You're right, Maurice was not (though, by extension, his wife was). However, I'm not just talking about her immediate family. There's also the extended family to consider. There's no question that Cynthia's father was ashamed of her, hence he sent her away. So when I talk about family shame, that's what I mean; there's no doubt that, if her father even spoke of it, he spoke of it in terms of Cynthia having brought shame to the family (and probably other extended family members saw it that way, too).
shareEverything rdeschene makes perfect sense to me.
When I initially heard the 'don't break my heart' line, I wondered about a possible rape, although, all earlier indications implied that she was just a bit promiscuous and couldn't remember Hortence's father.
But having read through several posts on the board and varying theories, I'm more convinced that Hortense was NOT the result of rape. More likely, as someone else pointed out earlier, that she had a very brief encounter with this fellow and probably didn't even know his name. Hence, she is unable to give Hortense ANY information about the father, which is heart-breaking to her. It forces her to remember a time and behaviour that she isn't proud of. She is also unable to provide her daughter with the information she so obviously wants - which would leave Cynthia feeling ashamed and guitly.
So put some spice in my sauce, honey in my tea, an ace up my sleeve and a slinkyplanb
If she was raped, it would have come out. It makes no sense to beat around the bush when everything else was coming to the fore. Cynthia was maybe entering into her rebellious phase where she drank and slept around with anyone who was available. As many people do claim to forget things when they are drunk, hence why she doesn't 'remember' being with a black man. The part she probably remembers after is that she was so drunk and passing herself around like currency that a black guy that was there (whereever she was) got a piece.
I see what you did there.
I've posted this on another thread, but I'm going to post it again here, because the signs of rape is imo pretty clear:
First clue is when Hortense and Cynthia first meet, and the way Cynthia refuses to believe Hortense is her daugthers. She says something like:
"I mean no offence or anything, but I've never been with a black man in my life." She sais that because she honestly can't remember. Not like "too-drunk-to-remember", but the brain has completely blocked it out, which is very common after traumas. This suspiscion grows on me when I see the contuniation of that line.
Just after Cynthia sais this, the remembering of it hits her with full speed. Because she is faced with the proof of the rape (Hortense), the memories she's managed to forget comes back, and she brakes down, saying "oh my god!" Which means: Oh, my God, I realise now I HAVE been with a black man!
She later says: "I thought you were born 6 weeks early."
She honestly did believe that. And that means she must have blocked it out quickly, because it was too painful to remember. And then, when Hortense asks about her father, and Cynth replies "Don't break my heart", it's because she doesn't want to remember it either. She doesn't want to think about it, it's too hard for her. Who wants to go through a rape?
**********
They blew up Congress!!! HAHAHA!
There's big difference though between when somebody was so drunk they can't remember something when it only happened say last week and the same situation where someone is trying to recall something after a long period of time. It is fairly easy to forget or mis-remember seemingly insignificant events in your life.
I don't think phrases such as "oh my god" and "don't break my heart" should be taken out of context as Cynthia speaks quite colloquially. I think more appropriate 'clues' as to Cynthia's past and why she gave up her baby lie when she says things like "I'm so ashamed" and "You would have been better off without me" implying she did it for the baby's own good, as well as her own.
Cynthia's excuse explaining why she did not want to keep Hortense as a baby, "I was only a little girl meself, sixteen. I didn't have no choice", suggests she did not want to be a teenage single mother, rather than hinting at a traumatic rape. She also says that she would have wanted to keep the baby if she had looked at it - which seems unlikely if would have reminded her of being raped.
Getting pregnant while you are a teenager is a very traumatic event, not as traumatic as a rape obviously, but still traumatic, particularly when you take into context that society would have been more less forgiving than nowadays when Cynthia was young. Cynthia's big reaction to what happened to her doesn't necessarily mean she has been raped.
I posted this in another thread that brought the same question, and I'll post it here as this seems to be the thread dedicated to answering the question of whether Cynthia was raped or not. I agree with Punky and Helenszone.
There is nothing about Cynthia's comments that necessarily mean she was raped and such an idea is inconsistent with the rest of the story. Rather it was that she was a very loose and sexual young girl who "never received much love", who got drunk and/or otherwise "dropped her knickers" in a one-night-stand. That's the cause for her shame, her prior loss of memory of the situation, and her inability to explain who the father is. Additionally, everything about her character and the relationship she has with her family is consistent with the fact that she had lived a shameful past and had not been the victim of something so grave. What's more, the penultimate scene was one of the family's final purging of their secrets and their lies. To be consistent with the moral of the story, if she was raped it would have been revealed at this point, as one of the secret wounds that was tearing the family apart. So while Cynthia revealed what she could, what actually broke her heart was that she was unable tell Hortense whether or not her father was a nice man because she got pregnant by having sex with a complete stranger. Which incidentally (and I'm sure not coincidentally) is what a close friend of Hortense confessed to doing in an earlier scene in the movie without any judgement on Hortense's behalf, which supports her as being such a healthy and well-adjusted person while, by contrast, her newfound family being bound by such fear.
IMHO Cynthia being a rape victim misrepresents the story's sensibilities. As Helenzone said, to think Cynthia was a rape victim adds another element to the story that detracts from its very significance.
By JamBap:
IMHO Cynthia being a rape victim misrepresents the story's sensibilities. (...) to think Cynthia was a rape victim adds another element to the story that detracts from its very significance.
I think the difference between Cynthia's experience with Roxanne's father and Hortense's father is the level of acquaintance. I believe Cynthia's experience with Roxanne's father was a holiday romance, whereas Hortense's father was most likely a alcohol-induced one night stand (in a stretch of alcohol-induced one night stands) where no connection was formed and no details were exchanged. After that phase, she ended up pregnant, and perhaps believed the last encounter of that phase resulted in the pregnancy. She was sent away to have the baby, not really knowing which encounter caused the pregnancy. She knew she did not want to keep the baby, so she had the baby, and they whisked the child away before she could get a look at it (black babies can appear as light as non-black babies when they are first born, as two of my three children did! Features may tell the difference, but in many cases differences between races can be only very subtle especially from across a room. After being in labor for a period of time, it may be difficult to identify the race of a newborn baby.) I think the key point is that Cynthia got pregnant with Hortense during a promiscuous phase, whereas her pregnancy with Roxanne occurred during a more monogamous phase.
Anyway Cynthia is incapable of giving any details to Hortense because she has none to give, and that's what makes it so heartbreaking. I didn't see any basis in the movie to assume she was traumatically attacked by some masked stranger of African descent. To the contrary, I think this was a movie where people were trapped and held hostage by their own choices until that cathartic 21st birthday party scene...
This is 1st time I've ever posted a message on this site. I guess I felt strongly enough about this topic to throw in my two cents. I loved this movie (both times I've seen it!), and I have enjoyed reading your comments thus far.
:-)
Hm - for me it was always obvious: She was raped at a young age and afterwards blocked it out of her memory (or at least tried to do it; she seems rather unstable, mentally). During the period in which the rape occured she was obviously regularly seeing someone - that's why she was so certain that the baby she gave up for adoption would be white.
shareshe said i thought they got the dates wrong, i thought you were born six weeks early...
this movie is heartbreaking...
To me, this line also implies rape. She had blocked the real experience from mind because it was unpleasant, and thought someone else was the father.
**********
They blew up Congress!!! HAHAHA!
She may have been raped...
or perhaps it could be prostitution. She had to look after Maurice and her father after her mother died, and from the way Cynthia lives now, it is quite likely that she struggled to afford it. So she may have seen prostitution as a last resort, and she didn't want to look at the baby because she just felt so ashamed of what she'd done. Or perhaps she felt that if she did look at the baby she would want to keep it and she just couldn't afford to do that.
Also we are not fully aware of the kind of dad Cynthia and Maurice had, Maurice did tell Monica that he hated him. So perhaps he forced her into it, maybe because he couldn't be bothered to find work.
Also after Hortense and Cynthia meet in that little cafe, and Cynthia realises and remembers that she really is hortenses mother, there is a scene between her and Roxanne discussing Roxanne's job. Roxanne complains about her job and Cynthia just says quietly to herself...."Well, I suppose there are worse jobs."
just a thought.
www.myspace.com/103760822
She was 15 when she was pregnant with Hortense. Any adult that sleeps with a 15 year old- even if it is not rape- is not "a nice man".
stopjohnofgod.blogspot.com
stopsylvia.com
You can say that again...
**********
They blew up Congress!!! HAHAHA!
She was 15 when she was pregnant with Hortense. Any adult that sleeps with a 15 year old- even if it is not rape- is not "a nice man".
I really like this discussion because, in a way, it shows more about ourselves than the film itself, since it's not really revealed what happened (a great film, BTW).
To be honest, before I came to this board, I never thought about Cynthia being raped. Never. It just never occurred to me that could be the case. Now when I read your theories, sure, I understand what you're saying...
But still doesn't make sense to me. It's a bit of a cliche, you know, of a young, innocent girl being raped and forgetting about it because of the shock. Too simple for this kind of a film. Plus, it doesn't (for me) go well with Cynthia. All the problems the character had in her life are obviously not because of a rape.
Emotionally and psychologically, the idea of a young girl who used to sleep around to get love and attention perfectly fits the character. Ok, this could be just my opinion, but for me that makes sense. No matter what we like to think, being a promiscuous girl even today is often embarrassing for the girl herself; and these were the 70s. Many girls do not like to talk about their one night stands, especially if they were drunk or something. What I'm saying is, emotionally, you feel like someone took advantage of you even if you said yes. It's a really embarrassing thing.
Obviously, a few weeks later she started dating another guy and she thought he was the father of the baby. You don't expect her to remember every one night stand she had in her life, I bet she couldn't remember how they looked like or their names (if she ever knew them in the first place). So yes, to me, it's quite possible she forgot she had sex with a black man once. It could be an embarrassing experience, maybe- like some people said- he was an older man, we don't know, but I don't think that it necessarily means she was attacked and raped. Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those people who make difference between an assault rape and a date rape- a no is a no and rape is a rape; but, maybe this was one of those situations when a girl wakes up and realize how awful the last night was; maybe she doesn't remember the details, maybe she doesn't want to remember, all she knows it was a bad idea. But she keeps going through the same mistake because she's hungry for any kind of love or attention. Forgetting that one of those sex partners was black is somewhat understandable; especially is she really really doesn't like to remember that period of her life.
With her second daughter it was different, it was a summer romance if nothing else. Maybe she was hurt, and angry, but she was obviously not that embarrassed about the whole event.
To sum up, for me, it was always about a particular, bad time in her life, when she did many "wild" and wrong things she's embarrassed about, and also a time when she got no love when she needed it the most. I just don't see the rape there, looks too simple for a story like that. But now when I'm reading my message, I guess it doesn't really make much of a difference, if she was raped or not.
I suspected that Cynthia was raped from the first scene with Hortense.
After telling Hortense over and over again that she had never been with a black man, a look of absolute horror comes over her face when she remembers and she states that she will not go into the details of her father. This is again reinforced at the end of the movie when she refuses to go into details over Hortense's father once again.
I suppose one could reach any number of conclusions, but I suspect rape.
All in all a great movie with a very good point to it.
[deleted]
I think maybe for some people the assumption that Cynthia was raped is easier to accept than the possibility that she may have had consensual sex with a Black man.
This movie is one of my favourites and I've watched it many times over the years...My first take on Cynthia's pregnancy with Hortense was it might have been by rape, BUT, at the birthday party when she says '...Don't break my heart darling...' I interpreted that to mean she really loved the father of the baby and it was a painful memory of loss for her.
And, since it would be have been a definite 'taboo' to be in an interracial relationship back then, perhaps she tried to forget it (and, I suspect, her father would have contributed to the issue by being very disapproving such that she felt ashamed to acknowledge that she loved a man of another race).
But, there are certainly many good points raised...I wish we could have confirmation from the filmmaker or something to find out for sure.
Christopher
'There’s a name for you ladies, but it’s not used…Outside a kennel! (Crystal Allen)'
at the birthday party when she says '...Don't break my heart darling...' I interpreted that to mean she really loved the father of the baby and it was a painful memory of loss for her.
Sorry, no. If you really love someone you don't forget you slept with them, still less that they impregnated you.
I used to want to change the world. Now I just want to leave the room with a little dignity.
BlondFashionista
This movie is one of my favourites and I've watched it many times over the years...My first take on Cynthia's pregnancy with Hortense was it might have been by rape, BUT, at the birthday party when she says '...Don't break my heart darling...' I interpreted that to mean she really loved the father of the baby and it was a painful memory of loss for her.
'Was my father 'a nice man'?'
'Oh, don't break my heart, darlin.'Cynthia dissolves into sobs and Hortense gets up to comfort her.
I doubt she was raped. It was probably a one-night stand that she'd forgotten about. She probably was a pretty wild 15-year-old (the baby was born when she was 16.
) The film gives us absolutely no reason to suppose that Hortense was the product of a rape.
"Joey, have you ever been in a Turkish prison?"
It gives plenty of reasons if you take the time to read through this thread. If what you are saying is the case, then why are so many people picking up on that vibe?
I'm writing this signature in bold so people know it's a signature
My conclusion is that Cynthia was raped.
Cynthia never forgot about (repressed) the rape, but she doesn't connect the rape with Hortense since she had sex with a white male 6 weeks later.
The main reason I think she was raped is because how hard it is to tell Hortense.
I don't buy the theory that she can't tell Hortense that her father just was a one night stand.
That isn't too painful, since she just told about how she barely knew Roxanne's father, BUT she says to Roxanne; "He was a nice man...he was", about her father.
Then asked directly by Hortense:
Hortense: "Was my father a nice man?"
Cynthia: "Oh, don't break my heart darling.".
Can the answer be any worse than; "No, your father was a rapist, and you're the child of a rape" ??
I find it quite obvious that she was raped, seriously!
Great post, Bro2. I agree completely.
**********
They blew up Congress, hahaha!!!
Bro2:
Then asked directly by Hortense:
Hortense: "Was my father a nice man?"
Cynthia: "Oh, don't break my heart darling.".
[deleted]
How could the mother not know that Hortense was black.Brenda Blethyn explains why she didn't know: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkjscO5kE2w