Loved the movie, I was actually rooting for them to end up together. Julia just seemed totally selfish, while I thought Sebastian actually really cared for him. Maybe it's just me who knows.
shareAs did I.
But it never would have worked out.
Sebastian was gay and in love with Charles.
Charles was in love with Julia. Not to mention he was straight.
I think that Charles fell in love with the idea of living with Sebastian and his family in that grand old house.
In the end they all ended up alone. Or lonely. With their hearts broken. Desolate.
It's not clear that Charles was straight in the book and it certainly wasn't obvious in the movie, in both it was clear that he adored Sebastian in a way that went beyond normal friendship. But it was also clear that Charles was a man who didn't act impulsively on his feelings, he repressed and hesitated a lot. Perhaps in a time and place where it was considered okay for two guys to act on their feelings he might have gone ahead, but in the world of "BR", he was too insecure of his place in the household and the world to take chances.
The thing is, the book absolutely REEKS of homoeroticism, the relationship between Charles and Sebastian is depicted as passionate and adoring, if never explicitly sexual. And that was considered normal back then, when young men spend their childhood, youth, and young adulthood in same-sex boarding schools, a certain amount of youthful experimentation and strong attachments with a best friend were considered normal, but weren't expected to last beyond college graduation. So Charles's feelings were considered normal for a young man of his class, up to a point, but he was also expected to transfer his feelings to a woman once he left school and entered adult life. And I have to say, transferring his affections to the sister of his male crush doesn't exactly scream "totally straight".
I have nothing against Julia, in fact I like her more than Charles the cold fish, but I'm still glad she didn't end up stealing her brother's man for life. If they all end up single, there are worse things.