I thought it was odd that the father, Paul, wasn't willing to meet/have lunch with his daughter without his wife Patty coming along. Am I to assume that the wife wouldn't LET him meet with Alice by himself? Another p-whipped husband?
The View from the Slums of Norristown, PA
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I got the feeling that Alice was sexual abused as a child by Paul. She wanted to go to lunch with him and be alone with him.
shareI wondered about this too. I really wasn't sure what to make of it though at the end of the day, if there was sexual abuse or not. It seems like tiny hints but really not enough for me to be like "yes that's unequivocally what happened!" Self injury definitely is something people who have been sexually abused do (not all obvs)...but also not everyone who SI has been sexually abused. So I don't know. She just seemed more screwed up than just being abandoned by him and seeing her mom get punched. And the undertone of her asking about lunch "alone"...yes, seemed to validate that suspicion...just the vibe, her demeanor, his reaction. Even the dad at the end, wanting to be "alone" with her...and then when she refused, he said that's how she was as a kid too. Seemed weird.
BUT maybe i'm just so programmed to leap to that conclusion. It could be like the poster said a few down -- it just showed his insincerity in giving any kind of a crap about her, since he didn't really want to bond or spend quality time with her. Then maybe at the end he was going to try to be all bff just to leave on a good note (for his own peace of mind) and she refused him that.
I don't know...
i did not pick up on that. not that i am disagreeing.
would she really want to be alone with someone who sexually abused her?
I got the sense that the father wanted his daughter to accept his wife and was not willing to meet with her unless she did. I got the sense of childhood abuse at first but then when they talked again later I just got the sense that he did not want to have her not like his new wife.
shareI took it as the director's way of showing us that, despite any words to the contrary, Paul didn't care about Alice - only about how getting forgiveness or acceptance would make him feel about himself. Not that he was whipped, just that his priorities were messed up. I think Alice took that meaning from it as well because she refused to talk to him alone at the wedding reception.
I also took it as validation for much of what Lynn (Ellen Barkin) felt about Paul - there was some question through out the movie if Lynn was excessive in her distrust of Paul. We knew he hit her, he admitted to it, but there was a question of how much she just gave in and let him take the eldest son. He didn't talk like an ahole while Lynn did come across as hysterical. But that conversation between Paul and Alice really clinched it - Paul was smooth and amicable but despite that he didn't care about how Alice felt, he cared about how Alice could make him feel better about himself.
^^ This
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