thoughts on Carol

This was a really good film. It builds dramatic tension incredibly well. The whole film I was waiting for when the two women would finally satisfy there longing for each other. It started out so simple. She was a shop girl into photography. She was in the middle of a divorce just discovering here feelings for other women. And from there the action slowly builds. Until, finally in a hotel room on New Year's Eve, they hook up. The scenes of their love making were almost like soft-core. Yet they had a tenderness that isn't found in soft-core. Afterword it is discovered that there was a Private dick spying on them for the older woman's husband. He intended to use it against her in the custody battle over their daughter.

Unlike most LGBT films this one ends up on an up ending. The divorce goes through and Blanchett's character loses her daughter, but the two women lovers end up together without much opposition from the husband or any of Mara's character's male suitors. The last scene leaves the viewer with the assumption that they will live together and happily ever after.

There is no violent scene like in Brokeback Mountain which end with the brutal beating of one of the gay cowboys. Nor is there an assassination like in Milk. From this I think it is true to say that Lesbians have it easier than gay men. Lesbianism has long been more easily accepted as a lifestyle than being a gay man. There is opposition. They have to distance themselves from the men in their lives, but they do it without much reprisal.

The films strength comes from the two characters involved in the relationship. Blanchett seems like a upper class woman who's sexuality was hidden for years by a loveless marriage. On the other hand is Rooney Mara's character which seems to have liked women from the start. So the major conflict with the story is between these two women who are in  love with each other and the male patriarchy which doesn't want to allow them to be in love with each other. This conflict is resolved when they do consumate their love.

I remember my Mother referring to these arrangements between two women who lived together but weren't married. She called them "Boston Marriages." I don't know if they all involved lesbians, but I would imagine that it was a front for women who were in love with each other but couldn't get married.

The film was very enjoyable. All of the settings were very evocative of the times of the 50s in America and New York. All the Fedora hats and long skirts with cigarettes and dry martinis. The setting was staged down to the last detail.

Very good film.