The Mother

The mother May losing her husband and her way of living has been totally lost on her kids. They are too self involved to even notice. The daughter seems sympathetic in the beginning as to understand why her mother can't return home after her father's death,while her brother Bobby is too busy with work to notice.No one talks to May,they talk at,around and about her. Except Darren,Bobby's friend and Paula's married lover.Although May believes and tells Paula that she could do better than Darren, Paula tries to get her mother to be a go between to gauge what Darren really feels for her. And as they talk May soon begins a sexual tryst with the man. It's amazing how you can see the way May starts to look younger throughout the film,and as Darren's affections and distance makes the daughter look more and more older. The film is about how we become complacent with the roles we are given and what's expected of us,and how they probably don't reflect who we actually are.May has lived her life through others expectations and now realizes the time she has lost because of it. And now May is grabbing for what's left ,cause she says "I'm not ready for old age". And even though her desire to grab life causes her to betray her daughter.


The daughter is actually so unsympathetic to the viewer that you really could care less,cause Paula is too busy blaming her mother for all that is wrong in her life.And Darren has his issues as well,an unhappy marriage, and autistic son,and yet you see what draws these women to him,not just his hard tone physique,but his kind and unassuming way. He listens to may..he talks easily to her. And his sexual interest in may doesn't ever come across as pity.The strange paradox of Darren is that he likes women,he likes pleasing them, he likes watching them awaken sexually.What he obviously can't deal with is emotional neediness.By the end of the film.it's hard to sympathize with anyone. But this film goes where too many others fear to tread.