MovieChat Forums > The Hole (2001) Discussion > Did Phillipa not know any of the story?

Did Phillipa not know any of the story?


Perhaps Liz's case was just dumped on the Doctor without any prior knowledge or even case notes, but it just seems odd to me that she would listen to Liz's story the first time, and not know instantly that she was lying. THREE PEOPLE ARE DEAD! And Liz claims they all got out alive. Surely the doctor would know at least this much, as to why she was so traumatised?
But overall, a cool film.

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They knew her story was false..


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I was confused about that too...like wouldn't the doctor have known three people were dead the whole time? It seemed like she believed the first version of the story and that's what she told the police?

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Dr. Philippa of course knew that everyone except Liz was dead and so Liz's first story could not have been true. But she thought that Liz was traumatized and so either could not recall what happened or was deluding herself that the terrible things did not happen. So instead of telling Liz that her story made so sense, Dr. Philippa hoped that by giving her "treatment" (psychiatrists in such movies are always inept and useless) Liz's condition would improve and then she could get the true story out of her.

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Did you miss the scene where she calls her colleague and says "She thinks she spent the last week in *beep* Disneyland"

There's also a gap between the stories Liz tells. She first tells the bit about how she and the others came to be in the hole but stops just after saying that Martyn apparently locked them in and didn't come back.

It's probably the next day or the day after that Liz tells the next bit of the story where everyone apparently lived happily ever after - and that's when Philippa starts to suspect there's more to it.

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I don't really see which part you are disagreeing with. The manner in which the film revealed the truth was perhaps deliberately awkward in order to withhold the FACTS as long as possible from the VIEWER. For example, the film did not even let us know (after showing us two bodies in the morgue) that Mike had died also and we have to wait until Liz's final story to know that.

The true sequence of events that happened after Liz's coming out of the hole was not known. However, it is reasonable to assume that the MINUTE Liz mentioned the hole, the authorities would have gone there immediately and discovered the three bodies (within an hour?) and what was left was to get the story out of Martyn and Liz. Liz played the game by deliberately telling a story which everyone knew was false, in order to fake trauma resulting in failure to remember what happened. Dr. Philippa as the psychiatrist did not confront her immediately for lying, and hoped that Liz would recover and eventually "remember". That was what I was saying.

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