What if...

I think the film is fine just as it is. How great to have a film that could be enjoyed by children who were abandoned or dealt with the death of a parent during a time when they needed them the most.

Marnie is an extremely beautiful moving film and it didn't need a romance between the two characters.

I'm reminded of a story I once read about how the death of Mufasa in The Lion King helped a boy deal with the death of his own father. I think this film may help people similarly.

I am not convinced there was any supernatural element in it the way it is now.... hear me out:

IMO, the movie is about a girl who starts living in her little own world ignited by the picturesque house. The tales from here long gone grandma starts to narrate and materialize to her, as though she was a bystander in those tales... in other words, this is not a ghost story in the traditional sense. But more a story about how a depressed girl uses her suppressed memories to help her cope and get her life back on track.

Much supports this view beside a mere interesting concept. Like how she says several times that she feels how she is forgetting stuff, so this "conflict" in memories is a hidden theme of sorts.... and also the flashback where she holds a doll which looks much like how she (and we) imagined Marnie to look like. And also how Marnie left the silo with her future husband and not Anna - because this is how it was in the story told to her as an infant.

One thing speaks against it though is how the elderly woman who is painting as well says; I see that you have met Marnie.... I wonder what she meant? Of course, perhaps she simply meant it as .... “hey, you know her ey”??? Doesn’t have to mean much, really except to mess with us the viewers.

I saw it completely as a ghost story and loved it for it, but there were things that made little sense. Now, I see it differently without any supernatural element... and love it even more. So perhaps you are right, it is better this way ;-)


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** I am normally not a praying man, but if you are up there, please save me Superman **

But that was the entire plot of the movie. If it was just a movie about two girls in love, they would've had to change so much, and it wouldn't have stood out as the brilliant film it was.