MovieChat Forums > The Man from Earth (2007) Discussion > Why would you call a man over whose wife...

Why would you call a man over whose wife just died?


One thing I thought was odd is that they called the psychiatrist to come over to speak with/examine Oldman, then we find out that his wife had just died the previous day. Why would you be so insensitive to call someone to come over for work purposes, knowing that their spouse died literally the day before?

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Clearly the group was very concerned with John's crazy story, so perhaps the friend who made the call did so out of deep concern, feeling that John's crazy behavior was serious enough to warrant the psychiatrist traveling there to speak with him.

They were clearly friends and colleagues, so it's not too unusual to think the psychiatrist would travel to see John (even a day after his wife's passing) when he is told something might be seriously wrong with John and that he may be able to help.

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Art, who made the call, may not have known about the psychiatrists loss. For all we know only the biology teacher knew it.

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by msegmx » Art, who made the call, may not have known about the psychiatrists loss. For all we know only the biology teacher knew it.

And from what I recall, Art had no reaction one way or the other that indicated whether he knew about the psychiatrists wife.

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isn't that what I said ?

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by msegmx » isn't that what I said ?


No.

You said ART "may not have known about...", and I simply added that I'd not remembered any specific reaction on his part (when everyone was informed of the psychiatrists wifes' death) to indicate whether he had known or not.

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Art was also clearly something of a dick, so consideration of others might not have been foremost in his mind.

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I assumed he was the 'Bury himself in his work' type of guy... He did show up after all.

and remember the 'discussion' was still at the "I think our friend is Nuts" phase when they called him over. they had do reason to think it'd escalate like it did.

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...they called the psychiatrist...


I didn't understand it that way. Art called the psychiatrist. There was no discussion beforehand about whether or not to do that. (Later expressions of support by several colleagues suggest what they would have said if there had been such a discussion ...but there wasn't.)

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