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Shell and Adam (spoilers)

posted 10 years ago by fabianatbrizola
4 replies | jump to latest

I can't quite grasp her relationship with Adam.
Obviously, Shell is eager for her father's attention. She's the one craving for more intimacy, and it's hard to say how much she understand about how inappropriate it is. When she invites Adam in, it almost seems like she wants to make her father jealous - and it kind of works. But then she decides to go for a drive with Adam, which indicates she wants his attention as well. And then she is angry when he drives away. Why? Is it that she didn't want to have sex, as if he took advantage of her? It was awful, of course, totally empty and soulless, and maybe she was too naive to see it coming. Maybe she wanted more affection. I get that. What I can't understand is, if she resented him for that day, then why welcome him in the end of the movie? The two scenarios don't seem to match.

And Adam, although selfish, seems to like her. And then, when she has Adam with her, all attentive and caring, she decides to leave. Why? She didn't like him? Or did he do something wrong? The idea that she let him stay because he wanted to and she couldn't say no seems unreal, especially if she resented him for before. I mean, she's naive, but not a whimp. In that final scene with him, her face is kinda blank, I can't understand what she's feeling. Adam, on the other hand, seems to notice something's off. I get that, now that her father was gone, she wasn't tied down to that place anymore, and she wanted to leave. But why leave like that, running away, with not even a word to Adam? That's very confusing to me.

[–] Howlin Wolf 10 years ago

I think she was hoping that Adam would distract her from her feelings about her father… When she realises that not only does this not work, but Adam's kindness is actually bringing back bad memories, after the death of her father she decides to make a totally clean break from him.

"Your mother puts license plates in your underwear? How do you sit?!"

[–] fabianatbrizola 10 years ago

Yes, it might be it.
Also, I've been thinking about this, and I guess she saw that her relationship with Adam kind of mirrored her father relationship with her mother, probably destined to end the same way. She already had showed her desire to leave that place when the young mother showed up.
And about Adam, I don't see him as a predator, as someone has described him. I see him with the same social awkwardness of her father, he doesn't quite knows how to express himself or behave. He also has his mother depending too much of him, like Shell's father depended on her. He has this desperate loneliness. He needs Shell. So, I think that Adam is like Shell in many ways, and a little bit like her father as well, and she wants to break from that pattern, from that life, so she has to leave him and that place.
Well, that's what I understood it.

[–] Howlin Wolf 10 years ago

I think 'breaking free of the pattern' is exactly right.

"Your mother puts license plates in your underwear? How do you sit?!"

[–] 10 years ago

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