Let’s all assume that there will be SPOILERS galore in both this post and the possible comment thread and go from there.
Apparently a lot has happened for me in the last (almost) seven years of being a mother. When I read Lionel Shriver’s We Need to Talk About Kevin back all that time ago, the book causing a big stir and me, with my first baby in my arms, I was though broadly sympathetic towards her, also genuinely troubled at times by the mother character narrating the story. Last week I finally saw the film adaptation and I have to admit to finding the character Eva entirely sympathetic. Not so controversial anymore. What’s changed? This could be partly about the way Tilda Swinton played her. She’s completely fantastic in it. There’s little dialogue in the film and certainly no internal monologue, but Swinton’s expressions are so good that you can pretty much pick out the exact text from the book that she is playing in any particular shot.
The novel is written in the first person through a series of letters written by Eva, who is coming to term with her ambivalence around motherhood and the incredible difficulties she experienced in mothering her son, Kevin, he who eventually goes on to carry out a schoolyard massacre. In the book you know exactly what Eva’s thinking, if not exactly whether her perspective is all together reliable; in the film you have to fill that in for yourself but Lynne Ramsey’s directing is incredibly skillful. (I loved the feel and look of this film but then I also loved Ramsey’s Morvern Callar).
There are so many good ‘motherhood’ scenes in this film – Eva beaten down and exhausted, driven to soothing herself by standing next to a jack hammer on a crowded street in order to drown our her colicky baby’s incessant cries; Eva, equal parts bored and defeated, desperately trying to conjure better mothering from herself for a defiant pre-schooler; and then also, Eva, increasingly isolated from her husband for failing to exhibit the maternal proficiencies he expects.
I just wanted to bundle Eva up and take her along to my feminist mothers’ group.
Only one element of the film is problematic for me and that is the casting choice for the teenage son, Kevin. All the Kevins are gloriously sullen through the various ages but Ezra Miller is a seriously handsome young man and he plays the teenage part very well but his casting tends to sexualise the older ‘Kevin’ character.Perhaps, given how charismatic Swinton is you really need to have someone equally as striking to watch on the screen with her? If I’d been in charge of casting I would also have reconsidered John C. Reilly for the husband/father, too. Reilly is a marvellous character actor but is he a believable pairing for someone as chic as Swinton? Granted he’s supposed to be a very different person to her, the all-American ‘everyman’ but I still didn’t find it worked for me. Anyway, whose asking me?
Did you see the film, did you like it? (Rachel Hills can be excused seeing as we’ve already discussed her dislike of the film).
Have you seem L. Ramsey’s ‘The Rat Catcher’? Its brilliant!
You’re the second person to tell me this, I must watch this soon!
*Spoilers*
I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I do remember from the book Kevin using his good looks to try and get a teacher into trouble by claiming that she had made inappropriate suggestions to him, a ploy which almost works except that his friend goes over the top and suggests something completely at odds with the teacher. But it almost worked. So I don’t think older Kevin being sexualised is necessarily a bad thing. I must get out to see the movie.
Hmm yeah, look it’s not terrible with the sexy Kevin, it works, it adds another level to his mystique but it feels different to the book. And it makes his, for instance, masturbation for the sake of intimidation scene with his mother a little vague.
I’m too scared to see it! I thought the book was amazing, but seeing that level of emotion and conflict on the screen would be too confronting for my sensitive soul…. Perhaps on DVD later when I don’t have to be brave around strangers.
I’m with you EES. I made it through the book, but I just don’t think I would be able to watch it on the screen.
Funny, I only have the reference of my own life, and I’m not a mum, but I felt absolutely sympathetic towards the mother character. I was surprised when analysis pointed out that you are getting a biased viewpoint and all may not be as it seems – I accepted her version pretty well.
Rachel Hills can be excused seeing as we’ve already discussed her dislike of the film.
Ha! I think that sometimes watching things for “work” can skew my perception of them. Because I have to seek out what’s interesting in them in order to write (what is hopefully) an interesting article, I’m often softer on the things I write about than some of the bloggers I read (among them: Black Swan, The Slap).
As you know, I hated the film, which makes me feel strange, since everyone else seems to love it (and now you!). I wonder if it might partly be because I was watching it for work, which in this case turned it into a chore. And also because I read the book in literally the same week: and regardless of its value as an independent, discrete product, I just think the book is much, much better.
Yeah, the book and the movie all in one week would be a bit tedious.
Have you seen Morvern Callar, be interested to see what your thought of the director’s other work?
I went with another mother of a teenage boy and we were ecstatic because Kevin made our little darlings look angelic by comparison. I”m convinced that’s part of the film’s appeal. (Sorry – fluffy comment – I’m in the group wot liked the movie AND the book, though.)
I watched the film, but didn’t read the book. I couldn’t take the casting of Reilly seriously either.
I enjoyed the tension surrounding what Eva was perhaps projecting, as everything is from her perspective (how did they get that toddler actor to have such a nasty expression on cue like that!?). I think the woman I watched it with came out of it thinking of Eva as a ‘refrigerator mother’, whereas I just felt sorry for her. The scene where the guy from her office turns on her after a gentle rejection is absolutely gut-wrenching. All the blame that is placed on her is intensified precisely because she doesn’t publicly break down and cry and sob and apologise and express guilt – i.e. do the femme grieving thing.
Kevin’s striking looks play into his sociopathy and disgust with other people – he’s better, he’s smarter, he’s hotter, etc. He competes with his beautiful successful mother, and injures his beautiful sister, but doesn’t seem to care too much either way about his frumpy father, other than being able to use him to annoy his mother.
I keep being reminded of this film by that Foster The People song which keeps playing at the moment.
Yes that song, I wonder how many people have actually listened to the lyrics?f
@Rachel – I think if you had had the chance to read and think about the book for a while before you saw the movie it may have been different. It was like the book takes a long time to digest, and I found myself chewing over it time and time again.
Hi,
I had a look at Rachel’s site but a search didn’t bring up her original objections to the film – any chance of linking this and the discussion – as I too had problems with the film and I’d like to see if there was any correspondence in our views. I have seen the film and not read the book.
The topic was terrific – focusing on the experience of the mum, particularly in light of what happened. There is certainly a lot of fertile territory for exploration and great to view all these happenings from the perspective of the mum.
But as with most things American there was an ‘over the top’ emphasis on the individual against the world. Not just that she was blamed by so many for what happened with her son – but also there was little questioning of the circumstances in which she had to bring up her children. She was clearly unhappy about moving to the suburbs but this was presented as an individual choice – something between herself and her husband/partner (the eternal good guy in the film). To this I would say look at the work of Eva Kittay in Loves Labour and Martha Fineman in the Myth of Autonomy – both critiques of the social structuring of care – privatized, individualized and gendered.
But apart from this I think the movie portrayed Kevin, to be born with this unresponsive and, almost evil, disposition and his mother was given the task of cajoling him to come around.
The movie was principally concerned with a power relationship between the two – a battle that the son won – and the mother was confined to purgatory for evermore by society, and by an inability on her own part to pull herself apart. Jessica Benjamin’s work is relevant here – good to see Like Subject – Love Object – in which she talks about mother-infant dynamics whereby either the infant/child has control over the mother/carer or the mother/carer has power over infant/child – a power relationship that is social structured through the ‘maternal role’.
However, Benjamin goes on to think about these dynamics in light of work on intersubjectivity – providing a basis for the acknowledgement of the two subjects – mother and infant/child – which forms the basis for a relationship. It would be great to read a critique of the film by Benjamin, Kittay or Fineman. I’ll see if I can find anything and let you know.
cheers, Joannie
Here is a terrific article available online – critique of the film –
see: http://eprints.qut.edu.au/19493/
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Chilling movie but masterfully executed. I loved the jackhammer scene as well. And, yes, please take Eva to group therapy. She deserves some support. Horrible the way the community treated her. But the end was satisfying when her son is terrified of going “to the big school” next year and she says “Well, you’ve managed well so far.” After all her self-torture, it’s the final confrontation between mother and son in which she holds him accountable. As always, Tilda Swinton is hauntingly brilliant.
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