# "45 Years" - Devastating Movie



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

I know there's a movie thread elsewhere, but I wanted to bring this one to the attention of all my sisters and brothers in CWI.

It's very English (even though Charlotte Rampling is actually French, I think) - i.e., very subtle and understated, and not overly talky - the most devastating scenes are non-verbal reactions to things.

It's about a 45-year marriage in which one of the spouses comes to find out that all is not as it had always seemed, just days before a big anniversary party they had planned.

It shows in the end all forms of infidelity are deeply damaging - even when they're not physical. Another theme seems to be that we can never fully know anyone - not even someone with whom we've spent 45 years.

Anyone else seen this one?


----------



## Openminded (Feb 21, 2013)

I haven't seen the movie but read about it. The title, when the movie came out, caught my eye because I was married 45 years before my divorce. 

Many people think very long marriages must be happy ones because you've been together for all those decades and survived so much together. But you never know someone quite as well as you think, no matter how long you are married, because there's no way to know what's really going on in their head. I was positive I could predict my ex-husband's every action -- no matter what the circumstance was. Turns out I didn't know him at all.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

I shared the theater with six or seven older couples - I was the only one by myself there.

I wondered what they talked about on the way home.


----------



## JohnA (Jun 24, 2015)

Hi @Nomorebeans 

No, I read a several reviews but none mentioned infidelity. Care to share ? 

Oddly enough it was a movie that triggered me and cause me to look for web sites like this one in May of last year. I belive it was "her infidity" with Richard Gere. The strength of the trigger surprised me as it had been maybe 8 years post divorce, and two moves.


----------



## BetrayedDad (Aug 8, 2013)

Openminded said:


> I was married 45 years before my divorce.


Wow. 

That's heartbreaking...


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

JohnA said:


> Hi @Nomorebeans
> 
> No, I read a several reviews but none mentioned infidelity. Care to share ?


I don't want to spoil it for anyone here who might watch it someday - I can Private Message you about it, if you'd like to know more and don't mind it being spoiled for you. I'd love to talk about it in more detail with someone.


----------



## arbitrator (Feb 13, 2012)

JohnA said:


> Hi @Nomorebeans
> 
> No, I read a several reviews but none mentioned infidelity. Care to share ?
> 
> Oddly enough it was a movie that triggered me and cause me to look for web sites like this one in May of last year. I belive it was "her infidity" with Richard Gere. The strength of the trigger surprised me as it had been maybe 8 years post divorce, and two moves.


*Is the movie that you're talking about the one that starred Richard Gere and Diane Lane and was called Unfaithful?

I can honestly say that particular movie caused me to trigger as well! Let's just say that "cheating movies" and me do not get along well!*
_Posted via Mobile Device_


----------



## 2ntnuf (Jul 14, 2012)

Looks interesting and sad.

45 Years*(2015) - Rotten Tomatoes

The song in the movie.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

arbitrator said:


> *Is the movie that you're talking about the one that starred Richard Gere and Diane Lane and was called Unfaithful?
> 
> I can honestly say that particular movie caused me to trigger as well! Let's just say that "cheating movies" and me do not get along well!*
> _Posted via Mobile Device_


I couldn't watch a movie like this again - possibly ever.

I went to watch "Manhattan" the other night on TV after not having seen it in many years but remembering I thought it was mostly funny when I first saw it a long time ago, and was horrified to realize there was just rampant cheating, blame-shifting, rug-sweeping - the works - going on in it. Ultimately, though, the two main cheaters do get run over by the Karma bus, so there's that.

I went to see "45 Years" because I sensed from the reviews that it wasn't about a physical affair. And it wasn't. It wasn't even about the kind of EA we often talk about here, which is also deeply damaging. It triggered me in a different way from these other movies about affairs that are all about sex or all about sharing yourself emotionally with someone other than your spouse. It is about an emotional affair - but a kind of EA that I can imagine is even more devastating than the traditional kind.


----------



## arbitrator (Feb 13, 2012)

Nomorebeans said:


> I couldn't watch a movie like this again - possibly ever.
> 
> I went to watch "Manhattan" the other night on TV after not having seen it in many years but remembering I thought it was mostly funny when I first saw it a long time ago, and was horrified to realize there was just rampant cheating, blame-shifting, rug-sweeping - the works - going on in it. Ultimately, though, the two main cheaters do get run over by the Karma bus, so there's that.
> 
> I went to see "45 Years" because I sensed from the reviews that it wasn't about a physical affair. And it wasn't. It wasn't even about the kind of EA we often talk about here, which is also deeply damaging. It triggered me in a different way from these other movies about affairs that are all about sex or all about sharing yourself emotionally with someone other than your spouse. It is about an emotional affair - but a kind of EA that I can imagine is even more devastating than the traditional kind.


*Trust me, Beans! An EA has the marked potential to cause just as much, if not more havoc than a PA does!

After all, the act of "betrayal" preeminently rears its ugly head in due course of the EA. The PA is just like marriage is in that the physical accouterments all happen strictly as a compliment of the original betrayal!*
_Posted via Mobile Device_


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

2ntnuf said:


> Looks interesting and sad.
> 
> 45 Years*(2015) - Rotten Tomatoes
> 
> The song in the movie.



The revelation brought on by this song at the end of the movie is shattering. One of the most stunning pieces of non-verbal acting I've ever seen. I would love for Charlotte Rampling to win the Oscar for this - but she totally won't. Makes me sad. Her face at the end of this movie is burned into my psyche.


----------



## 2ntnuf (Jul 14, 2012)

I think I'll have to rent it this weekend. I hope it's out. Darn...45 Years DVD Release Date


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

I saw it. Maybe I'm thick, but I didn't think it had any real infidelity in it. It was ultimately about a wife who discovers her husband is not the man she thought he was. It is about a hidden secret, and the damage such secrets can do to a marriage.


----------



## GusPolinski (Jan 21, 2014)

arbitrator said:


> *Is the movie that you're talking about the one that starred Richard Gere and Diane Lane and was called Unfaithful?
> 
> I can honestly say that particular movie caused me to trigger as well! Let's just say that "cheating movies" and me do not get along well!*


Seeing Richard Gere turn Oliver Martinez' head into an ashtray was pretty cool, though... right?
_Posted via Mobile Device_


----------



## JohnA (Jun 24, 2015)

@Nomorebeans please PM 
@arbitrator that's the one. 6 or 8 years out and still a massive trigger 
@GusPolinski AMEM


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

bandit.45 said:


> I saw it. Maybe I'm thick, but I didn't think it had any real infidelity in it. It was ultimately about a wife who discovers her husband is not the man she thought he was. It is about a hidden secret, and the damage such secrets can do to a marriage.


It's more than that - and you're not thick - it's very subtle.

She doesn't just realize that he wasn't the man she thought he was. She realizes that he never loved her. Not even in the beginning. 45 years later.


----------



## Adelais (Oct 23, 2013)

Nomorebeans said:


> It's more than that - and you're not thick - it's very subtle.
> 
> She doesn't just realize that he wasn't the man she thought he was. She realizes that he never loved her. Not even in the beginning. 45 years later.


Thanks for the heads up. I won't be watching that movie. Sorry you had to go through it Nomorebeans.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

Nomorebeans said:


> It's more than that - and you're not thick - it's very subtle.
> 
> She doesn't just realize that he wasn't the man she thought he was. She realizes that he never loved her. Not even in the beginning. 45 years later.


Yep. She finds out she was Plan B all along. 

The movie is okay. It is very slow paced and understated. Actually, I got bored with it and turned it off about 15 minutes from the ending. I just didn't care enough to keep watching. 

If a movie doesn't have explosions, robots or titties, it's hard for me to maintain interest.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

IMFarAboveRubies said:


> Thanks for the heads up. I won't be watching that movie. Sorry you had to go through it Nomorebeans.


The movie, realizing I was Plan B the whole time in my 25-year-marriage, myself, or both? 

Don't feel bad for me. It may sound weird, but the movie helped me. It showed me that my ex viewed me the same way in our marriage, even when I thought it was good - as a substitute for what he really wanted all along. I never really mattered to him - and deep down, I always suspected that.

I've struggled for a while during my recovery over the last year with blaming myself for his affair - thinking that maybe I never really loved him, like he likes to tell himself to make himself feel better.

But the truth is, I did love the man I thought he was. I respected and admired him and cared about him deeply - more than anyone else in my life. I thought he was the best person I knew. That is what love is to me. He did not return any of that sentiment for me. I realized watching this movie that he never did. It didn't wreck me - it helped put me back together again.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

bandit.45 said:


> Yep. She finds out she was Plan B all along.
> 
> The movie is okay. It is very slow paced and understated. Actually, I got bored with it and turned it off about 15 minutes from the ending. I just didn't care enough to keep watching.
> 
> ...


I like a good action movie as much as the next guy, but I also love slow-paced character studies. As long as the tone is even and maintained throughout, I don't mind a slow build to the finish.

I'd actually like to watch this again, because now that I know what Kate realizes in the end, I think there are many clues to it early on, before she even begins to unravel the awful truth.

But I'm a weirdo that way. I like good drama. Not all the time. But it has its time and place for me.


----------



## JohnA (Jun 24, 2015)

Hi @Nomorebeans, actually I think she did get the real guy she married. What crushed her was for 45 years all she was a poor man's plan B. That her only value to her husband was her ability to be a stand in for the GF. That it was more then she looked like her and in some ways acted and thought like her. It was 45 years spent be moded to be her, 

In some ways this echoes what the biggest hurdle a BS must come to terms with: the person they are married to is not the person they married. That in someways the WS had put expectations on them that where fantasy.


----------



## Runs like Dog (Feb 25, 2011)

So....Orwell's quiet desperation was spot on....


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

JohnA said:


> Hi @Nomorebeans, actually I think she did get the real guy she married. What crushed her was for 45 years all she was a poor man's plan B. That her only value to her husband was her ability to be a stand in for the GF. That it was more then she looked like her and in some ways acted and thought like her. It was 45 years spent be moded to be her,
> 
> In some ways this echoes what the biggest hurdle a BS must come to terms with: the person they are married to is not the person they married. That in someways the WS had put expectations on them that where fantasy.


I have to disagree with you somewhat. The person I was still married to a year ago IS the person I married. I just didn't see it for 25 years.

Now that I honestly look at the entirety of our marriage, I see him, from the beginning, as he always was. Always trying to mold me into this other person I wasn't. "You should grow your hair longer." "You should wear sexier clothes/higher heels." "You don't walk right - you should take longer strides." "If you're gonna color your hair to keep it blonde anyway, you should try to dye it darker and see how that looks." Everything was always about changing me into something else, not about appreciating what I was. 

It was always smoke from a distant fire with him. I'm starting to think that fire was his first wife, who cheated on him after less than two years of marriage and left him for his best friend. She was kind of heavy and short with long dark hair, just like his AP and now girlfriend. Odd that it would take him 27 years to get back to that. I guess he thought he should love me. And I know that what he thinks everyone should do is important to him. To a point, apparently.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

Nomorebeans said:


> But I'm a weirdo that way. I like good drama. Not all the time. But it has its time and place for me.


I dig independent films, American made, and if the actors and the story are really good I can sit and get into it. SlingBlade and Mud are two that come to mind. 

British drama has to have really top notch actors for me to want to stay focused, and even then if they get too long and expositional I find myself reaching for the remote. British Rom-Coms? No fvcking way. I was forced to sit through Brigit Jones's Diary on a date once and I thought I was going to chew my tongue off.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

bandit.45 said:


> I dig independent films, American made, and if the actors and the story are really good I can sit and get into it. SlingBlade and Mud are two that come to mind.
> 
> British drama has to have really top notch actors for me to want to stay focused, and even then if they get too long and expositional I find myself reaching for the remote. British Rom-Coms? No fvcking way. I was forced to sit through Brigit Jones's Diary on a date once and I thought I was going to chew my tongue off.


I LOVE Sling Blade and Mud. Here's another favorite: The Station Agent. Peter Dinklage, Patricia Clarkson, Bobby Canavale. So freaking good. Check it out if you haven't seen it.

I also hate British Rom-Coms. I kind of hate Rom-Coms in general, because I think they're neither romantic nor funny most of the time. But I love English Drama. And English Comedy. Just not the romantic kind. I've always been an Anglophile. Maybe because I keep all my emotions bottled up inside, and internalize and over-analyze everything.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

There is a part of me that is an Anglophile, and I hate that part of me.


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

I went with my mother to see it and we saw two different movies. She felt that the husband intentionally deceived his wife about the intensity of his feeling for his dead fiancee. I think he didn't think it mattered that she did not know since he married her and there was no chance that he would ever see his dead fiancee again. 

He didn't know that the discovery of her body would bring those feeling to the fore. I think he loved his wife but not the way he loved the dead fiancee. His wife thought he loved her more than he did. My mother thought that he should have told her how he felt before they got married. I think he did the right thing. There was no way he could resolve his feelings, they were frozen in time and place until they weren't. His love was enough to sustain a good marriage just short of 45 yrs. 

One theme was that we can never know a person completely even after many years in an intimate relationship.Even if there is no attempt to deceive. We know a partner in a particulate set of circumstances, including time and place. Change any of those and it's up for grabs. I don't think we know ourselves enough to predict what we are capable of doing in novel situations. I've seen people I thought I knew do things I would never have expected in relationships. 

When people say that they or their partner would never cheat, I want so badly to say, don't be so sure. Anyone can cheat, anyone. They don't know that not cheating starts with staying away from tempting situations.


----------



## Adelais (Oct 23, 2013)

Nomorebeans said:


> The movie, realizing I was Plan B the whole time in my 25-year-marriage, myself, or both?
> 
> Don't feel bad for me. It may sound weird, but the movie helped me. It showed me that my ex viewed me the same way in our marriage, even when I thought it was good - as a substitute for what he really wanted all along. I never really mattered to him - and deep down, I always suspected that.
> 
> ...


I was sorry you felt bad watching the movie, however it seems that it was therapeutic. Sometimes ripping off a scab and cleaning the wound again helps it heal quicker.


----------



## JohnA (Jun 24, 2015)

I had not realized you where his second wife and his first cheated on him. Before I thought he was scum, now I will not insult scum by using that comparison. In event after your post I immediately thought his AP is in for the living hell she deserves. There is truly something to be said for ironic black humor.


----------



## 2ntnuf (Jul 14, 2012)

JohnA said:


> Hi @Nomorebeans, actually I think she did get the real guy she married. What crushed her was for 45 years all she was a poor man's plan B. That her only value to her husband was her ability to be a stand in for the GF. That it was more then she looked like her and in some ways acted and thought like her. It was 45 years spent be moded to be her,
> 
> *In some ways this echoes what the biggest hurdle a BS must come to terms with: the person they are married to is not the person they married. That in someways the WS had put expectations on them that where fantasy*.


Might be an interesting thread starter. I've thought this and then let it pass. Didn't know anyone else thought similarly.


----------



## aine (Feb 15, 2014)

Nomorebeans said:


> It's more than that - and you're not thick - it's very subtle.
> 
> She doesn't just realize that he wasn't the man she thought he was. She realizes that he never loved her. Not even in the beginning. 45 years later.


I watched it a few days ago (after reading this thread) and I agree with your assessment. It was really an emotional affair.
The wedding ring, the pregnancy, etc (trying not to give much away) really said a lot. I thought the ending was so poignant and the look on her face was devastating. He was totally oblivious thinking that life would go on as normal. How true to real life!


----------



## aine (Feb 15, 2014)

bandit.45 said:


> Yep. She finds out she was Plan B all along.
> 
> The movie is okay. It is very slow paced and understated. Actually, I got bored with it and turned it off about 15 minutes from the ending. I just didn't care enough to keep watching.
> 
> ...


Typical male :grin2::grin2::grin2:


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

aine said:


> Typical male :grin2::grin2::grin2:


If I live long enough I might actually develope a frontal lobe.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

Catherine602 said:


> I went with my mother to see it and we saw two different movies. She felt that the husband intentionally deceived his wife about the intensity of his feeling for his dead fiancee. I think he didn't think it mattered that she did not know since he married her and there was no chance that he would ever see his dead fiancee again.
> 
> He didn't know that the discovery of her body would bring those feeling to the fore. I think he loved his wife but not the way he loved the dead fiancee. His wife thought he loved her more than he did. My mother thought that he should have told her how he felt before they got married. I think he did the right thing. There was no way he could resolve his feelings, they were frozen in time and place until they weren't. His love was enough to sustain a good marriage just short of 45 yrs.
> 
> ...


I am 100% with your mother.

He never even told his wife that his girlfriend/fiancee before her was pregnant! That is intentional deceit. As is not disclosing to her that she was his fiancee in a manner of speaking - that he had fully intended to marry her. Those are pretty big things to keep to yourself and not share with your life partner.

When I was first dating my ex and things were starting to get serious, he told me about his first wife and what happened. I thought he was being completely transparent, and knowing him to be the pathological liar I now know he's always been, he probably believed he was, too.

He trash-talked her to me - said she was "crazy," "unstable," etc. His excuse for marrying a crazy, unstable woman was that he barely knew her. They had a long-distance relationship for six months while he was in pilot training, and he proposed to her when he finished it and was stationed at an AFB in another part of the country. They had been divorced for a year when I met him, in a different state from where she continued to live. There were little clues I chose to overlook that pointed to his feelings for her running much deeper than he told me.

He had multiple photo albums filled with pictures of her and of the two of them together that I happened across one day after we got married when I was trying to find a drawer to put some of my extra papers and files in.

Do you know how many photo albums he amassed of me and the two of us together after 25 years? You guessed it. Zero. And he kept those, after having been divorced from her for two or three years at that point. I can see being lazy about it or forgetting to get rid of them or put them further away. But he said he kept them on purpose, because she was his wife, after all, and they had a "history" together.

I put one together once of a 10-day trip we took together to England and Wales when we'd been married for about five years. When I looked at it recently, I noticed that he looked annoyed in a couple of the photos. I had thought we had a lovely time together and didn't really have any memories of discord or disagreement the whole time, but there it was, right on his face.

While I'll admit I'm projecting quite a bit into this movie, I do think it's the writer's/director's intention that he had a EA for the entire marriage, and that he never really loved his wife - he spent all those years *pretending* she was Katya. He picked her so he could do that. Her name was Kate. And he admitted to her that she looked a lot like her. He couldn't open his eyes and look at her when they had sex or when they danced to what was supposedly their wedding song (but was really his song with Katya, which is what hits her like a ton of bricks in the end). Why do you think that is?

It certainly isn't the action of a man who loves his wife.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

I don't think it gelled for her until she found the slide reel and the photos, and then at the end to be dancing with him like everything was okay. She had had enough of the facade and I'm pretty sure she stormed out of that party, hopped into a cab and left him forever.


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

@Nomorebeans I feel as if I was watching another movie. My interpretation was that he loved the dead fiancee yes and was initially drawn to his wife because of the similarity in their appearances. 

It seems ambiguous though, does he or does he not love her. How do we know that he does not love her.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

Catherine602 said:


> @Nomorebeans I feel as if I was watching another movie. My interpretation was that he loved the dead fiancee yes and was initially drawn to his wife because of the similarity in their appearances.
> 
> It seems ambiguous though, does he or does he not love her. How do we know that he does not love her.


Well of course it's ambiguous. It's a European movie. European movies have to be complex and vague.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

Catherine602 said:


> @Nomorebeans I feel as if I was watching another movie. My interpretation was that he loved the dead fiancee yes and was initially drawn to his wife because of the similarity in their appearances.
> 
> It seems ambiguous though, does he or does he not love her. How do we know that he does not love her.


Again, I'm probably projecting. But to me, it's clear that he does not love her. I'd like to go back and watch it again, because I don't think he ever looks at her once while he's talking to her in the entire movie. (And it's clear his eyes are closed when they're having sex - and - hello - she asks him to open them, and he promptly loses his erection when he looks at HER - and both times when they're dancing.) When they're eating dinner, they sit side by side, and he doesn't turn to look at her when they're talking, but she turns to him when they are. When he's first reading her that letter, he's facing her at the table, but I don't think he ever looks at her - he looks at the letter the whole time he's talking about it.

What's most telling to me, and it's alluded to a few times in the movie, is that he never took any pictures of her. Not ever. He took a whole fvcking slide deck of Katya, and he only knew her for an apparently short time. Married for 45 years, and they can't find a single picture he ever took of her??? Then, their longtime best friends present them with a bulletin board of photos of them at their party. But they are photos friends took over the years, not any they got from him.

This is her realization at the end, and why she looks so horrified: This man she was married to for most of her life NEVER LOVED HER. It's very clear to me.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

Yep


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

bandit.45 said:


> Well of course it's ambiguous. It's a European movie. European movies have to be complex and vague.


I think it's more the case that Americans are stupid, and American movies are made largely with that in mind.

And I say that as an American who is sometimes stupid, herself.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

If I had been in her shoes, and the roles were reversed, I would have pulled out my gat and croaked her right there on the dance floor in front of everyone. Now that's the way you end an American movie.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

Nomorebeans said:


> I think it's more the case that Americans are stupid, and American movies are made largely with that in mind.
> 
> And I say that as an American who is sometimes stupid, herself.


Americans aren't stupid, its just that studio produced movies nowadays are targeted for the young college age demographic. You need to check out independent films and stay away from the Hollywood schmaltz. 

I have seen some really, really good independent American films lately...and some not so good, but all of them are several levels higher than Hollywood bilge.


----------



## arbitrator (Feb 13, 2012)

*Damn! All of your discussion regarding this flick has my curiosity picqued! Think that I'll have to take it in sometime this weekend!*
_Posted via Mobile Device_


----------



## jb02157 (Apr 16, 2014)

Openminded said:


> I was positive I could predict my ex-husband's every action -- no matter what the circumstance was. Turns out I didn't know him at all.


Definitely. You also can never predict whether the one you pick to marry is going to be a good choice throughout the marriage. At this point after more than 25 years, I neither know my wife or could have ever imagined what she would have turned out to be. It is true that people change but when they change for the worse you're stuck with them.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

jb02157 said:


> Definitely. You also can never predict whether the one you pick to marry is going to be a good choice throughout the marriage. At this point after more than 25 years, I neither know my wife or could have ever imagined what she would have turned out to be. It is true that people change but when they change for the worse you're stuck with them.


Or, if you're a cheater, you're stuck with them until something (you think is) better comes along.

The tragedy in this movie is that he has hidden his cheating (and he has been cheating) from her for 45 years. If his first (and only) love's body was never found, it would have been hidden from her until death did them part.

I'm with bandit that I imagined her walking out of that party and leaving him forever after the credits rolled. I could not live with a man who I realized had lied to me to that extent for our entire relationship - I would find him repulsive, which she clearly does by jerking her hand away from his in that final scene.


----------



## Openminded (Feb 21, 2013)

Many very long marriages do come to a natural end without the truth ever being known -- that their spouse married them for reasons other than love. Very often the spouse knows for decades something's not right, but they don't know what, and they spend their life trying to figure it out. Some do eventually guess the truth but think they can make their spouse love them if they just try harder. At this point, I'm surprised when any marriage works long-term but some obviously do. It's just too bad more don't.


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

Holy sh!t Beans, I missed the fact that he never looked at her. I thought it was because of age related mental fuzziness. 

I have to watch this movie again. My mother was very thoughtful after the film, on the other hand, I needed a double espresso. I was surprised that the film was nominated for best film. It went at such a glacial pace that I thought it was boring. Apparently, it was way too subtle and nuanced a film for me. My brain is addled from seeing every Marvel comic movie at lest 3 times in IMAX and loud surround sound.


----------



## TeddieG (Sep 9, 2015)

Nomorebeans said:


> I shared the theater with six or seven older couples - I was the only one by myself there.
> 
> I wondered what they talked about on the way home.


That's why I go to our $2 movie theater here. You might have to wait six weeks after the show first opens but chances are good that with the exception of maybe one couple in the room it is practically a private screening. 😡


----------



## TeddieG (Sep 9, 2015)

Runs like Dog said:


> So....Orwell's quiet desperation was spot on....


Except that it was Thoreau who said it. If Orwell did he stole it, or "borrowed" it, or convinced himself he thought of it.


----------



## phillybeffandswiss (Jan 20, 2013)

bandit.45 said:


> Americans aren't stupid, its just that studio produced movies nowadays are targeted for the young college age demographic. You need to check out independent films and stay away from the Hollywood schmaltz.


NAH, Hollywood markets to that specific demographic. You'd be surprised how many so called "independent films" are produced and funded by those schmaltzy Hollywood studios.


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

TeddieG said:


> Except that it was Thoreau who said it. If Orwell did he stole it, or "borrowed" it, or convinced himself he thought of it.


Sounds interesting, can you explain.


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

TeddieG said:


> That's why I go to our $2 movie theater here. You might have to wait six weeks after the show first opens but chances are good that with the exception of maybe one couple in the room it is practically a private screening. 😡


Do you get reclining seats, gourmet popcorn and cherry icee?


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

phillybeffandswiss said:


> NAH, Hollywood markets to that specific demographic. You'd be surprised how many so called "independent films" are produced and funded by those schmaltzy Hollywood studios.


So you hate America....

How long have you been a communist?


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

Catherine602 said:


> Holy sh!t Beans, I missed the fact that he never looked at her. I thought it was because of age related mental fuzziness.
> 
> I have to watch this movie again. My mother was very thoughtful after the film, on the other hand, I needed a double espresso. I was surprised that the film was nominated for best film. It went at such a glacial pace that I thought it was boring. Apparently, it was way too subtle and nuanced a film for me. My brain is addled from seeing every Marvel comic movie at lest 3 times in IMAX and loud 3D sound.


Do you mean the Oscars? It's not nominated for Best Picture this year. I think it should be. Here are the nominees:

The Big Short
Bridge of Spies
Brooklyn
Mad Max: Fury Road (seriously?)
The Martian
Revenant
Room 
Spotlight

Sad to say I have only seen The Martian and Spotlight. I liked both of those, but I think The Big Short will probably win. I'm going to see that on Monday.

I'd like to see Brooklyn and Room, too.

Was 45 Years nominated for a BAFTA? I'm bummed I missed that show - that's my favorite awards show, Anglophile that I am.

Charlotte Rampling is nominated for Best Actress, and I wish she would win, but they don't generally give that to the most deserving actress, in my view. Case in point - Jennifer Lawrence has won it, and has been nominated for it for the third time. Please.


----------



## phillybeffandswiss (Jan 20, 2013)

bandit.45 said:


> So you hate America....
> 
> How long have you been a communist?


Says the guy telling a poster to avoid the American studio industry LOL.


----------



## TeddieG (Sep 9, 2015)

Catherine602 said:


> Sounds interesting, can you explain.


Henry David Thoreau, one of the great transcendentalists, said that men live lives of quiet desperation. I can't remember in what work, though but i found it online (and posted below); its from Walden. I think it was used in Dead Poet's Society (I think I recall Robin Williams' character saying it to the students). I don't know that Orwell ever did; I've never run across it any of his works. But the poster attributed it "quiet desperation" to Orwell so maybe he said it too.

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats. A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.”


----------



## TeddieG (Sep 9, 2015)

Catherine602 said:


> Do you get reclining seats, gourmet popcorn and cherry icee?


Yes, and good hot dogs too! We do have a fabulous theater with incredible seating and even a diner, but it is expensive. Even though it is very popular it is rarely very full.


----------



## TeddieG (Sep 9, 2015)

Well now you guys have made me want to see the movie. I assumed it was going to be about a guy who had a long term girlfriend. !!!

I saw Spotlight and loved it, and hope to see The Big Short. For whatever reason, I'm not particularly interested in The Revenant.


----------



## phillybeffandswiss (Jan 20, 2013)

I saw them all and The weakest, to me, is Brooklyn. If you trigger, do not watch Brooklyn. Still a decent movie.


----------



## jb02157 (Apr 16, 2014)

Nomorebeans said:


> Or, if you're a cheater, you're stuck with them until something (you think is) better comes along.
> 
> The tragedy in this movie is that he has hidden his cheating (and he has been cheating) from her for 45 years. If his first (and only) love's body was never found, it would have been hidden from her until death did them part.
> 
> I'm with bandit that I imagined her walking out of that party and leaving him forever after the credits rolled. I could not live with a man who I realized had lied to me to that extent for our entire relationship - I would find him repulsive, which she clearly does by jerking her hand away from his in that final scene.


I would have imagined that ending to. If she jerked her hand away from his at the end, maybe that did happen. 

If that happened to me and I has all of the sudden my wife was cheating on me all along, I think I would laugh...there is actually a dumb ass that would cheat for my wife's fat ugly body and horrible personality?? I would say, ok chief, take her away and then I could finally divorce her.


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

TeddieG said:


> Henry David Thoreau, one of the great transcendentalists, said that men live lives of quiet desperation. I can't remember in what work, though but i found it online (and posted below); its from Walden. I think it was used in Dead Poet's Society (I think I recall Robin Williams' character saying it to the students). I don't know that Orwell ever did; I've never run across it any of his works. But the poster attributed it "quiet desperation" to Orwell so maybe he said it too.
> 
> “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats. A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.”


Sounds awful. I don't know much about Thoreau or transcendentalists philosophy. You have inspired me to do a little study. Thank you.


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

phillybeffandswiss said:


> I saw them all and The weakest, to me, is Brooklyn. If you trigger, do not watch Brooklyn. Still a decent movie.


Why??  I loved the movie. It was so positive about the possibility of hope and renewal for those willing to leave the past behind and step into an unknown future.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

TeddieG said:


> Well now you guys have made me want to see the movie. I assumed it was going to be about a guy who had a long term girlfriend. !!!
> 
> I saw Spotlight and loved it, and hope to see The Big Short. For whatever reason, I'm not particularly interested in The Revenant.


I thought Spotlight was excellent, too. I thought Stanley Tucci and Liev Schreiber stole it. I normally love Mark Ruffalo, but he wasn't as quietly powerful as either of them were. Of course Michael Keaton was great, but I always think so - he's one of my all-time favorites.

I, too, have no interest in seeing Revenant. I really like Leonardo DiCaprio, but for my money, his best performances were in The Departed - MAN, he was perfect in that, and, don't laugh - The Great Gatsby. While that movie wasn't everyone's cup of tea, he was the Jay Gatsby I pictured when I was reading that book - I mean, he nailed it, and I love that book and had no idea he had it in him. Sam Waterston was the perfect Nick, but Robert Redford was terrible as Gatsby in the original. Just awful.

But I digress. I like Leo and really won't mind if he wins - it'll be Karma for not winning for The Departed (I don't know if he was even nominated for that, but he should have been), but that movie just looks like about three hours of nothing but physical and psychic suffering and pain. No, thanks.

And since someone else said "Brooklyn" will be a trigger, no, thanks to that one, too.

Strangely, like I said, this movie didn't exactly trigger me. What it gave me was more like a revelation, and one that has vindicated and healed me.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

DiCaprio was really good in the "Aviator" I thought.


----------



## phillybeffandswiss (Jan 20, 2013)

Funny, I think Departed is one of his good not great movies. Revenant is EXCELLENT and it will not be Karma, it will be well deserved if he wins. He should have two like Denzel should have three.


----------



## Runs like Dog (Feb 25, 2011)

160 minutes? No thanks. How is it different or the same as "Jeremiah Johnson" (1972)?


----------



## Steve1000 (Nov 25, 2013)

Wife and I saw "45 Years" a few days ago. I generally like slow-paced movies about life, but I didn't care for this movie. After the movie ended abruptly, my first comments was "I guess that's where the budget ran out". However, I also must say that I don't agree it was a movie about infidelity. The husband's former girlfriend died before he even met his current wife.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

Steve1000 said:


> Wife and I saw "45 Years" a few days ago. I generally like slow-paced movies about life, but I didn't care for this movie. After the movie ended abruptly, my first comments was "I guess that's where the budget ran out". However, I also must say that I don't agree it was a movie about infidelity. The husband's former girlfriend died before he even met his current wife.


Correct. It's about living a lie, and tricking your spouse into living a lie.


----------



## Runs like Dog (Feb 25, 2011)

Movies like that aren't enlightening to me. They don't tell me anything I don't already believe or know.


----------



## 2ntnuf (Jul 14, 2012)

bandit.45 said:


> Correct. It's about living a lie, and tricking your spouse into living a lie.


After reading all the comments, I'm wondering how much of a lie it really was? Did he love his current wife the best he could? 

Did she have a choice when he asked her to marry him? 

If so, she must have thought he loved her, right? 

Did he treat her well, but was just too scarred from his past to completely open his heart to her? Does anyone ever completely open their heart to their spouse? 

If she knew there was something wrong all along, why didn't she address it sooner? 

Why did she marry him if she thought something was wrong?

Given his past and the fact he could not change it, could he have loved anyone any better than he loved his current wife?

Is this movie about perceptions and how they change over time, rather than lying or infidelity of some sort? 

I tend to agree that it doesn't seem like infidelity of any kind I can think of. Maybe a crazy kind of emotional abandonment, in a way. 

But if she knew all along something was wrong, how can it be abandonment unless he originally gave her something he doesn't at present?

Is it about whether it's really worth trying to reexamine the life we chose for ourselves, once it's near the end? 

Thanks for starting this thread NMB. It has entertained me and made me think. It's been great reading all the responses and thoughts.


----------



## TeddieG (Sep 9, 2015)

Nomorebeans said:


> I thought Spotlight was excellent, too. I thought *Stanley Tucci and Liev Schreiber stole it*.
> 
> :iagree::iagree:I normally love Mark Ruffalo, but he wasn't as quietly powerful as either of them were. Of course Michael Keaton was great, but I always think so - he's one of my all-time favorites.
> 
> ...


At various times of my life, when I was struggling, I would disappear into a move theater. I can't wait to see 45 Years. Thanks for starting this thread.


----------



## phillybeffandswiss (Jan 20, 2013)

Runs like Dog said:


> 160 minutes? No thanks. How is it different or the same as "Jeremiah Johnson" (1972)?


You won't watch it so, it doesn't matter.


----------



## phillybeffandswiss (Jan 20, 2013)

bandit.45 said:


> Correct. It's about living a lie, and tricking your spouse into living a lie.


Well, the movie did its job because some agree with you and others, like me, do not. Still, people are talking about it.


----------



## SimplyAmorous (Nov 25, 2009)

I just looked the film up.. I'd watch it if it was on Netflix..

Here is the trailer >>  45 Years 

The 1st Amazon review said:


> This is, without a doubt, one of the best films I have ever seen. The acting is superb, the script heart wrenching, the two together making for a marital drama of epic proportions, yet conducted privately, with stillness, internal suffering and external enquiry and incredulity.
> 
> It poses the question: what does one do when the foundation on which we have built our internal life, in relation to our partner and our marriage,begins to reveal itself to have been other than we had believed? How do we react if we discover that, but for the death of another, not only would we never have been married to our partner, but that he still holds true to the notion that the dead person (who cannot disappoint), is still the ideal? And what do we then do, when, at out anniversary celebration, surrounded by the friends who have supported us and our marriage, throughout the years, the re-playing of the song we danced to at our wedding, now reveals resonances that we had never realized, in relation to the dead person and our partners longing?
> 
> ...


----------



## 2ntnuf (Jul 14, 2012)

phillybeffandswiss said:


> Well, the movie did its job because some agree with you and others, like me, do not. Still, people are talking about it.


Yeah, but I think I switched in this thread somewhere as I learned more. 

And, I'm not saying Bandit's opinion is wrong. He's just as right as any of us.

I'm just wondering if what I was thinking makes any sense. I don't really think there is a right or wrong answer. I think the film was written so that it could bring out our individual thoughts.


----------



## phillybeffandswiss (Jan 20, 2013)

Yes, exactly what I said. I just disagreed with his opinion.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

phillybeffandswiss said:


> Funny, I think Departed is one of his good not great movies. Revenant is EXCELLENT and it will not be Karma, it will be well deserved if he wins. He should have two like Denzel should have three.


I'm glad to hear this. I like it when the truly best performance actually wins.

I really think he's been good, if not great, in everything he's done. I really enjoyed him in Catch Me If You Can and Inception, as well. Can't think of anything I haven't liked him in. Whereas there are other actors of his generation, like Bradley Cooper, that I like in some things but not others.

Getting back to this movie, I don't think the husband gave his wife a proper choice as to whether she should marry him or not, because he hid his true feelings from her for the woman he lost, and led her to believe he could love again and loved her, when he never really did. 

Now, was that malicious on his part? No. But it was selfish and kind of cowardly. I see him as someone who couldn't be alone. So he latched on to someone who looked like his lost love and fooled himself into believing he loved her, but he was really projecting the dead girl onto her. As far as Kate was concerned, he seemed to love her. After all, he didn't tell her he was going to marry this other girl - that they even pretended to be married when they were on their hiking trip - and that she was pregnant with their child when she died. If he had revealed those facts to her before they married and she married him anyway, then it could be argued that she had herself to blame - or at least that she knew what she was getting herself into when she married him.

By the way, did anyone who's seen it notice how sad they both seem to be throughout the movie that they didn't have children? He's out of sorts at the lunch early on with their longtime friends and their daughter whose photography skills they're bragging about. She looks wistfully at an apparent grandfather taking a grandchild out in a boat partway through. It's revealed that she's a retired teacher of literature. She is genuinely interested in her postman's impending parenthood. Lots of clues that they might have wanted children, or at least she did, but they didn't for some reason. That haunts me. Is it that she couldn't? (We know he could.) Or did he not want them with her?

Again, everybody - he never looks at her in the movie. He's not verbally or physically abusive. But he clearly does not love her. In the end, she realizes that she was just a substitute for the only one he's ever loved. 

That's the way I see it, anyway.


----------



## 2ntnuf (Jul 14, 2012)

So, because he didn't tell her about his past, he lied, and she didn't have an informed choice, because she didn't have all the information about his past. Interesting. 

I looked this up and can't find it playing in my area, as far as I can tell. It's likely been around too long. Bummer.


----------



## phillybeffandswiss (Jan 20, 2013)

This is what makes the movie interesting to me. Some of the dynamics fit many different secrets, lies or privacy in a marriage. For examples, what is off limits? I mean we forgive certain things and not others. It was a tad boring, but it really made me think.


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

2ntnuf said:


> So, because he didn't tell her about his past, he lied, and she didn't have an informed choice, because she didn't have all the information about his past. Interesting.
> 
> I looked this up and can't find it playing in my area, as far as I can tell. It's likely been around too long. Bummer.


This is how I saw it. And I'll admit, again, that I'm projecting. I came to find out over the course of my marriage that there were many things my ex didn't share with me that I believe someone should share with their chosen life partner. For instance, I found out only in the last five years of our 25-year marriage that his father beat the crap out of him and his younger siblings on a routine basis when they were growing up. I can understand repressing that and not wanting to share it with anyone in your later life. The thing is, I've come to find out that he did share it with the two EA partners I now know he had over the years, instead of with me.

Watching the trailer SimplyAmorous shared, I see that Geoff does look at Kate from time to time in the movie. I came away from my first viewing feeling like he never did look at her. I was exaggerating this in my mind. What I see in the trailer is that he looks at her here and there, but the only time he seems to really see her is in a pivotal scene where he admits to her that his first love was his official 'next of kin' - and before telling her that, he sort of analyzes her, I think, in a quizzical way, as if he's wondering to himself for the first time why he married this person in the first place. 

Classic trickle-truthing by a cheater, if you ask me.


----------



## 86857 (Sep 5, 2013)

People always idealise the one they can't have. And too bad for the one they can. . .


----------



## Chaparral (Jul 17, 2011)

GusPolinski said:


> Seeing Richard Gere turn Oliver Martinez' head into an ashtray was pretty cool, though... right?
> _Posted via Mobile Device_


Like seeing your team score a last minute winning touch down.0


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

What about the meaning of the discovery of the body after so many years? Reminds me of the poem by John Keats, "Ode to a Grecian Urn" (I googled it). This is part of one stanza. He commenting on a static picture of happy maidens and men wooing them.

"Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve;
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,
For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!"

His dead fiancee is frozen in time and so is his love. He died with her. He could have had love and happiness but instead, he chased a dead woman he could never touch. It's another zombie film. The dead fiancee makes an appearance.

It is a devastating movie, but not for the wife but for the one who lived decades in a fog of fantasy when reality was so rich, the husband character. 

The cinematography was breathtakingly alive and lush. Their house was cozy and warm with wonderful mementos of lives well lived. A communicative and loving wife, wonderful friends, flowers, sky, trees, all vibrant. In contrast, he was gray, detached and dispassionate. He gazed at his wife like he was looking through gauze just like he gazed at the beauty that surrounded him. 

The husband character was the one who was the more deceived and pitiful. He embraced a cold dead dream when he could have had the love of a beautiful warm woman. At lest his wife had decades of the joy and the happiness of love. At the end, he lost something much more valuable than he knew he had, the love, respect and warmth of his wife of 45 yrs. 

Among other themes, the film dealt with how we handle loss. The need to move forward. It's easy to get seduced by dead dreams and miss the real ones


----------



## Nomorebeans (Mar 31, 2015)

Catherine602 said:


> What about the meaning of the discovery of the body after so many years? Reminds me of the poem by John Keats, "Ode to a Grecian Urn" (I googled it). This is part of one stanza. He commenting on a static picture of happy maidens and men wooing them.
> 
> "Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
> Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve;
> ...


Beautifully said, Catherine.

I've never pitied my ex-husband in all of this - not for for an instant - until reading your words just now. He left me for the 20% he was sure he wasn't gettng, only to give up the 80% he already was.

That used to make me angry, but now it just makes me sad.


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

I discussed the movie again with my mother. I told her about what I thought. There are parallels for her marriage too. She liked my interpretation. 

I really enjoy this discussion, it's a wonderful thread Beans. Without it, I would not have seen the richness of the movie and it's hopefulness. The wife character's look at her husband at the end was both chilling and a needed declaration of freedom. She discovered who her husband really is. She seemed to be working for his love, giving more than she got from him. Well now she is free to bestow it on more worthy recipients. 

Do you think he will notice the difference? Will he regret his deception? Probably not. However, he won't have the attention of a solicitous and caring wife anymore. Bad timing, he needs it now more than at anytime in the last 45 yrs - he is getting older and infirm.


----------



## 2ntnuf (Jul 14, 2012)

I see where someone might think he wasn't in love with his wife because he couldn't let go of his first love. I thought she(his wife) realized he never loved her _after_ the discovery? Something isn't making sense for me. Read further to understand why I stated the above.

Anyway, I see how someone might think he lost out, but I don't think he did. He was with a woman who believed he loved her and he probably did. I can't imagine her staying with him, if he didn't show her how much he loved her day after day, for 45 years. In some way, she must have felt loved. Don't you think? 

In my mind, the alternative to that, which is her believing he didn't love her and staying anyway, is incomprehensible. Though, oddly enough, I can imagine that it is like the five love languages where we learn what our partner understands to be love and attempt to do it as often as is practicable. And that, my friends is what is weird to me about that book's concept. You don't have to really love them, as stated here about this movie and the husband's subtle reactions to his wife. You just have to do the things which make them feel loved. Again, maybe a subtle difference, but it is expressed in this movie. 

That's a different take on it, but my thoughts are evolving. I'd thought of that before and then as the thread developed, I forgot about the idea. 

I do think the timing of the news of his first love coming out was bad, but life is like that.


----------



## Steve1000 (Nov 25, 2013)

I'm surprised to see that many here have strong feelings about the relationship in this movie. At the very end, I thought the writer was telling us that at the end, the husband realizes how much he does love his wife.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

Nomorebeans said:


> For instance, I found out only in the last five years of our 25-year marriage that his father beat the crap out of him and his younger siblings on a routine basis when they were growing up. I can understand repressing that and not wanting to share it with anyone in your later life. T*he thing is, I've come to find out that he did share it with the two EA partners I now know he had over the years, instead of with me.*


My take?

Because those women didn't have any skin in the game. 

He didn't want to marry them, he just wanted their attention and validation. 

He didn't share that info with you because he saw you as the woman he wanted to spend his life with. He did not want to appear to be "damaged goods", so he conveniently left out that portion of his life and just let you know about the "less awful" things. He wanted the job as your husband and feared you would reject him if you knew. He wanted you to accept his POS dad as a father in law. 

Yeah...you were defrauded. I feel bad for you, but I also feel bad for him, because you most likely would have accepted him anyway, so his fears were really irrational, as were the lies he told to avoid those fears.

They call it toxic shame... and if it is not dealt with, it makes people do all sorts of stupid sh!t. We talk about this a lot in the AA meetings I run.


----------



## bandit.45 (Feb 8, 2012)

Steve1000 said:


> I'm surprised to see that many here have strong feelings about the relationship in this movie. At the very end, I thought the writer was telling us that *at the end, the husband realizes how much he does love his wife*.


Yeah... I would imagine....

...as hes watching her climb into a cab to drive away and out of his life. 

He was an idiot.


----------



## Openminded (Feb 21, 2013)

He certainly wouldn't be the first spouse to wake up too late. Women, in particular, will often put up with a lot -- longer than we should -- but when we're done, we tend to be _really_ done and we move on without another thought. My 45 year marriage ended that way and I know of other very long marriages that did as well. Hopefully, if it were real life, hers would have too.


----------



## 2asdf2 (Jun 5, 2012)

I am surprised at the harshness with which so many people view him.

As the movie shows, he is in grief. The fact that her body is intact after fast freezing, adds a twist to his grief that also weighs on him.

For another thing, the circumstances of the disappearance of the girlfriend were not revealed. I can think of a number of scenarios in which the woman fell into a crevasse that would scar him for life. 

Did she willingly jump after an argument?

Did he make a mistake resulting in her death?

Did he purposely "encouraged" her to jump?

Was she saving him and lost her footing in the process?


The wife, is "all about herself" and does not show a lot of empathy. She does not seem to try to understand the delayed grief her husband is experiencing.

An interesting puzzle that made an interesting movie.

The acting from Rampling and Courteney was superb. Loved his accent!


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

@2asdf2 The ice princess fell into a crevasse while they were hiking. He didn't show much empathy for his wife for 45 years. He knew that he did not love her nor would he ever love her. He used her for his domestic comfort while he worshipped at the alter of the dead. He admitted he did not tell her about how much the dead girl meant to him and that he lied about it at first when she asked. His wife was denied the choice of being plan B for this man or plan A to someone else. 

This touches on an important themes in the movie, how secrets effect intimate relationships and how unconscionable it is to use people as this character did. An example IRL - the woman who marries an unwitting man for the convenience of having a salary and children. Should he be empathetic when she pines for the man she really loved? He has been stripped raw emotionally for decades now he has to drag up sympathy for his deceiver? 

It's not harsh when people suffer the consequences of horrible acts of deception. The deceived is doing what they never had a chance to do in the first place, make a choice. Sometimes it's to jettison the deceiver from domestic bliss in one way or another. To bad for them.


----------



## Catherine602 (Oct 14, 2010)

Nomorebeans said:


> I've never pitied my ex-husband in all of this - not for for an instant - until reading your words just now. He left me for the 20% he was sure he wasn't gettng, only to give up the 80% he already was.
> 
> That used to make me angry, but now it just makes me sad.


It is sad for them Beanie. Part of your anger was probably due to thinking that your ex had the ability to judge what you gave. In so doing, you may have assumed that what you gave to the relationship had as much value as he placed on it. 

No, there is an inherent value to being loving, a companion and a good friend that has nothing to do with the value the recipient assigns. 

It's common human stupidity. Like scores of people who invested millions with Madoff. They already had millions of dollars securely held that most people would never have. Yet they let it out of their hands in an attempt to get what no ever gets, something for nothing. 

I don't know your story but I would guess that your ex is on a fools journey.


----------



## 2asdf2 (Jun 5, 2012)

Catherine602 said:


> @2asdf2 The ice princess fell into a crevasse while they were hiking.
> *We don't know that. There was no scene depicting how it happened. We only have narrative from Husband that may or may not reflect truth*
> He didn't show much empathy for his wife for 45 years. He knew that he did not love her nor would he ever love her. He used her for his domestic comfort while he worshipped at the alter of the dead. *I don't know what you base this assertion on*He admitted he did not tell her about how much the dead girl meant to him and that he lied about it at first when she asked.*He was not ready to discuss his first tragic love with a new girlfriend. Not at all rare* His wife was denied the choice of being plan B for this man or plan A to someone else. *She was noones plan B. Wife was plan A as girlfriend had been dead for some time*
> 
> ...


*The strength of the movie is precisely the ambiguity of the details and the wide interpretations that it leaves open.

Obviously you enjoyed it as much as I did.*


----------

