LMI & LTROI: Deleted Scenes

[a_contemplative_life]

Glad to hear that, actually. According to dictionary.com, the term "innocence" is derived from Latin words and essentially means "harmless" or "doing no harm". Isn't that a laugh? I, also, don't find one girl more "innocent" than the other unless the word is used strictly in a sexual sense - but the novel leads us to believe that Eli may have in the past also used her body tactically, doesn't it? If Abby is really "slinkier" and honestly more open to a certain kind of approach, might it not be in fact somewhat more "innocent" than using a swish here and a pirouette there in a game of sexual blackmail?

Sacrilege! How can you accuse such a sweet, loveable little creature of such things?!

[cmfireflies]

Sacrilege! How can you accuse such a sweet, loveable little creature of such things?!

+1. Although, if I'm being super nit-picky, around the time of that picture, I remember Eli giving a quick sideways glance when hugging Oskar. I understand it's hard for new actors to resist the temptation of looking directly at the camera, could Lina have slipped up here? Or is Eli feeling a bit guilty that Oskar is falling for her?

I give you the pool scene as the first clear indication that Eli has already affected Oskar's life adversely. Granted, such an extreme culmination could not have been easily predicted, but Eli did tell Oskar to hit back, and hard. Oskar became Jimmy's direct victim, but Eli's victim indirectly.

We are all victims of each other indirectly. But Eli's advice was good, giving with his best interests in mind. Like you said, no one could have predicted the end result at the pool, but Abby encouraged Owen to use his knife, while Eli did not, right?

"Get real, dude", they'd say. "They're murderers; the guys they rook into doing their evil for them are evil, too, and it's bad that the girls turned them into what they became, but they're all killers. Besides, what's so terrible about how the guys live compared to how we live? They got money coming out their ears, they can afford new apartments every few weeks, all the food they want and probably everything else, and they don't have to worry about which bills to pay this week or next! They don't have to run off to work every day and risk getting mauled by all this machinery! Let those smug lazy sons of zeroes try putting in a single day like ours! We bet they can't, they're so mollycoddled!"

I never considered that Thomas's life could be better than slaving away at a factory for some 40 years. There's stories of workers who were intensely loyal to their crummy factory jobs and vehemently anti-union only to get fired and left with bupkus. Maybe a life with Abby is better than that, I don't know. I don't really believe that Thomas chose his life, because he had so little chance for anything else. The bond between him and Abby was so strong (by necessity of survival) that it precluded thoughts of any other kind of life. There's a difference between working in a factory because it's the best job you can get and working in a factory because your world begins and ends on the factory floor.

The vast majority of people might or might not kill strangers to survive and call it just, but there's a scale to these things. Suppose a particular person's personal survival "depended" on wiping out an entire village; would the villagers, having foreknowledge of their impending demise, agree with this "justness"?

My point is that, as you say, survival is a prime directive (whether of self, or family) so there is no justice in such a situation, only victors justifying their actions in hindsight.

Owen might someday grow up to fill in for Thomas, you say? I think they'd say "Too [censored] bad!" What's so terrible about it? The girls kill, the guys kill, sure, and they all deserve to be thrown into a blast furnace, but after all the thousands of people the girls killed just to keep their own skinny little bodies upright, we're supposed to get upset that they're "abusing" a boy or man every few decades?

They have no reason to care. But it's important that Eli and Abby care. Because out of the thousands they have killed, Abby and Eli claims to love Owen and Oskar, respectively. How they treat their loved ones is a reflection of their character. It is a measure of their humanity, for lack of a better word. Their loved ones deserve better than total strangers. Eli's relationship with Oskar is so moving because it is a reflection of her best possible self. It's what love is, isn't it? The idea that if we can meet even one person who is happy to see us for who we are, who understands and forgive our flaws and who we love in return, we would try our hardest to ensure that they are happy. If such a person would be willing to kill and die for Abby, would he be sad to learn that Abby wouldn't do the same for him? (Not that Thomas would want Abby to die for his sake or that he'd be angry that Abby goes on to find happiness without him, but wouldn't Thomas merely want to know that he means as much to Abby as she does to him?) If you think that a child can never match the devotion of an adult, isn't Abby obligated to end the relationship when Owen is no longer a child?

As I understand it, some of us are given an LTODD in which Eli and Oskar become of a kind, and that Oskar himself is sometimes seen by others with a markedly predatorial look in his eye. If so, what does this say about the likelihood of Oskar's having retained his humanity? Couldn't this mean that Oskar doesn't trouble himself with the costs, and that his continued relationship with Eli has taken her further away from her own humanity? They have eachother, for as long as they stay together, and they'll live "happily ever after" together unless... or until... - but they'll not likely have anybody else.

Eli is probably worth "losing humanity" for Oskar. Didn't the director commentary say that Oskar was cutting the ties that bind him one by one. Humanity, like morals, evolved to help us survive as a species. Oskar and Eli's survival require something different, so I don't see it as a loss if Oskar doesn't trouble himself with the costs or that Eli would actually be maybe driven to be more monstrous to protect and be with Oskar. In fact, isn't Eli already more violent, decapitating people for Oskar's sake? There probably is a line somewhere, but where that line is is for them to decide, and no one else.

The precariously balanced Eli who first met Oskar at the jungle gym may now be truly lost forever.

Yeah, but Eli wouldn't have it any other way, during the course of the movie, at least. If things go sideways afterwards, she tried.

[a_contemplative_life]

Although, if I'm being super nit-picky, around the time of that picture, I remember Eli giving a quick sideways glance when hugging Oskar. I understand it's hard for new actors to resist the temptation of looking directly at the camera, could Lina have slipped up here? Or is Eli feeling a bit guilty that Oskar is falling for her?

I always interpreted that as the sign of a person who is thinking carefully about whether to ask a question. Such as, "would you like me if I wasn't a girl?"

[lombano]

I never caught (if it was mentioned) why the movie didn't show Abby almost cradling Owen's head at the pool; what's shown instead in the movie proper strongly suggests Abby towering triumphantly (dominantly) over an overwhelmed Owen; I, for one, have mentioned many times in the past that the expression on Owen's face included strong elements of terror which would have been sharply mitigated with such a display of tenderness.

Terror? I didn't see that, I saw something like distaste, maybe regret, although also relief. Possibly regret at being saved only to become 'save some for later' - in a sense, Abby was being kind only to be cruel (even if not out of viciousness).

Eli is so much more everything in our eyes than Abby, including "innocent" and "virginal".

Innocent, yes. Or maybe that's not quite the right word - one feels Eli would die for Oskar if it came to that, but I was never convinced of that with Abby. Things like 'I knew you wouldn't let me' or how she drops the cube with her hunger pangs convince me she'll always put her own needs first. Thomas is, in the grand scheme of things, one more corpse for the body count, as would be Owen if it comes to that, but nevertheless there is something worse about it, a betrayal that is not the case with the jogger or Virginia - Thomas literally did everything humanly possible for her, and these betrayals make her less human.
As for 'virginal,' that's true in film Eli's case, but not book Eli.

The filmmakers would have had to re-arrange it; what's shown in the "making of" has Abby almost cradling his head between her legs, his nose maybe six inches away from, well, you know. That would have spun the whole story into an unwelcome direction, with the folks on the IMDB boards screaming "seductive cold-blooded little witch!" and joking "here's how monsters give birth!"

Actually, the bolded part could've been interesting if done properly - the LTROI pool scene itself is somewhat reminiscent of baptism but also childbirth (blood, water, someone getting pulled out). By that view, Eli would be playing the midwife, but Abby would be playing the mother by that deleted scene.

I give you the pool scene as the first clear indication that Eli has already affected Oskar's life adversely. Granted, such an extreme culmination could not have been easily predicted, but Eli did tell Oskar to hit back, and hard. Oskar became Jimmy's direct victim, but Eli's victim indirectly.

We are all victims of each other indirectly. But Eli's advice was good, giving with his best interests in mind.

I'd go further and say that if the bullies had been of the garden variety, Eli's advice would've worked.

[jkwilliams]

He's her husband, and he loves her; he'll do whatever he can to support her. She's his wife, and has been for forty years; who knows what she has to give that he might find of value? The movie hints oh, so very quietly and oh, so very briefly at just one thing without giving us the slightest clue what the rest of the bond between them might based on. I'm guessing it's a give-and-take thing, as it is with all viable and vital marriages of such longevity. The movie just shows enough of their relationship to underscore her child-like humanity and her monstrosity without concerning itself at all with Thomas' point of view. Like the cop, he's really just a Cardboard Cutout (tm) put there partly for this purpose (the remainder of said purpose being to leave us wondering just what it means that Owen sings "eat some now, save some for later" on the train).

I've always had trouble thinking of them as a married couple.

As Thomas grew older and took on the guardian role, his relationship with Abby probably became more like a parent and child. They both still seem to have feelings for each other but a grown man can't view a 12-year-old as a real partner anymore. She went from being the girl he fell in love with as a boy to the daughter he has to take care of as an adult. Maybe that's the real reason why he can't bring himself to leave her.

[sauvin]

He's her husband, and he loves her; he'll do whatever he can to support her. She's his wife, and has been for forty years; who knows what she has to give that he might find of value? The movie hints oh, so very quietly and oh, so very briefly at just one thing without giving us the slightest clue what the rest of the bond between them might based on. I'm guessing it's a give-and-take thing, as it is with all viable and vital marriages of such longevity. The movie just shows enough of their relationship to underscore her child-like humanity and her monstrosity without concerning itself at all with Thomas' point of view. Like the cop, he's really just a Cardboard Cutout (tm) put there partly for this purpose (the remainder of said purpose being to leave us wondering just what it means that Owen sings "eat some now, save some for later" on the train).

I've always had trouble thinking of them as a married couple.

As Thomas grew older and took on the guardian role, his relationship with Abby probably became more like a parent and child. They both still seem to have feelings for each other but a grown man can't view a 12-year-old as a real partner anymore. She went from being the girl he fell in love with as a boy to the daughter he has to take care of as an adult. Maybe that's the real reason why he can't bring himself to leave her.

You're saying Thomas is fully developed emotionally and mentally?

[gymmy64]

I've always had trouble thinking of them as a married couple.

As Thomas grew older and took on the guardian role, his relationship with Abby probably became more like a parent and child. They both still seem to have feelings for each other but a grown man can't view a 12-year-old as a real partner anymore. She went from being the girl he fell in love with as a boy to the daughter he has to take care of as an adult. Maybe that's the real reason why he can't bring himself to leave her.

You're saying Thomas is fully developed emotionally and mentally?

He's likely as fully devoloped emotionally and mentally as most guys, though obviously he appears to lack the inhibition most people have to killing others. I never got the sense, at least from Jenkins' portrayal, that he was mentally deficient. For the two to escape detection all those decades, I would think that both would need to be more clever than not.

Emotionally? I could see Thomas as being somewhat deficient in that area, but unfortunately, he would not be unique in that, based on many of the people I've dealt with over the years. I don't doubt that the young boy that met and fell for Abby so many years ago is still inside of him, but I also believe he's also had to have been big brother and eventually a father figure to her at different points in their relationship. If that is the case, then it is not difficult to see why he would be willing to do anything for her, even if it meant killing strangers. I don't think you need to look any further than that to see why he does it, and why he stays with her---she is everthing to him. To him, she's worth murdering others; even his own life is forfeit, if it will keep her safe.

It's heavily implied that Thomas was not Abby's first caretaker, so Abby is more responsible for what happens to Owen than Eli is responsible for Oskar. Because Abby lived through what happens with Thomas, she owes it to Owen not to repeat that tragedy. I'm not saying it would be easy, or even maybe possible, but the key for me is that the movie makes no attempt to show that Abby would treat Owen differently.

I grant that Abby knows what could happen if Owen goes away with her, but to her credit, she is shown initially brushing the boy off. She also departs without Owen, though she does return eventually. Was all of this some sort of "long con" on Abby's part, to eventually trap Owen into going with her? I don't believe this to be the case. I think she fully intended to move on without him, but perhaps couldn't face being alone again after several decades of companionship. A selfish decision, but one that I can forgive due to Abby's "age". I would be far more judgmental if an adult or even an older teen was making this same decision.

You're right in that the film makes no attempt to show will change her ways. Indeed, I thought it was implied (in horror movie fashion) that another cycle had started. However, it's always possible that Abby could actually learn from her last relationship and try a different path, be it turning Owen or letting him go down the road.

[sauvin]

You're saying Thomas is fully developed emotionally and mentally?

He's likely as fully devoloped emotionally and mentally as most guys, though obviously he appears to lack the inhibition most people have to killing others. I never got the sense, at least from Jenkins' portrayal, that he was mentally deficient. For the two to escape detection all those decades, I would think that both would need to be more clever than not.

One can be academically advanced (at 50something) beyond any hope of comprehension by the average mere mortal and still be emotionally arrested. Likewise, one can be superlatively emotionally advanced (at 50something) and be unable to outperform a fifth-grader academically. The "mentally advanced" is actually something of an umbrella term that covers entire spectra of descriptions of which "cleverness" would form only the tiniest part.

What we generally think of when we mention emotional and mental advancement are the products of challenge, stimulation and nurture, not to mention natural capacity. Thomas has probably been challenged and stimulated by very little that doesn't have much to do with direct survival. As such, I'd place Thomas mentally in pretty much the same kinds of brackets I've placed bikers, truck drivers and garbage collectors in the past, people whose sole claim to immortality might be scrawled in permanent marker on the walls of a truck stop men's room.

Emotionally? I could see Thomas as being somewhat deficient in that area, but unfortunately, he would not be unique in that, based on many of the people I've dealt with over the years. I don't doubt that the young boy that met and fell for Abby so many years ago is still inside of him, but I also believe he's also had to have been big brother and eventually a father figure to her at different points in their relationship. If that is the case, then it is not difficult to see why he would be willing to do anything for her, even if it meant killing strangers. I don't think you need to look any further than that to see why he does it, and why he stays with her---she is everthing to him. To him, she's worth murdering others; even his own life is forfeit, if it will keep her safe.

And if the sole major influence over their relationship comes from internal sources (that is, between themselves) rather than from without (the community), being a brother or a father "at different points" doesn't necessarily exclude an essentially spousal relationship. If this is difficult to accept, understand that I have difficulty accepting nurturing a stone cold serial murderess over the span of decades; the possibility of sexual and metasexual improprieties or transgressions that do not leave the privacy of their own apartment are far less interesting than the blood of thousands being spilled for no "good" reason.

It's heavily implied that Thomas was not Abby's first caretaker, so Abby is more responsible for what happens to Owen than Eli is responsible for Oskar. Because Abby lived through what happens with Thomas, she owes it to Owen not to repeat that tragedy. I'm not saying it would be easy, or even maybe possible, but the key for me is that the movie makes no attempt to show that Abby would treat Owen differently.

It's heavily implied that Abby and Thomas met when Thomas was himself Owen's age. I see absolutely no implication (or contraindication) of prior caretakers.

She also departs without Owen, though she does return eventually. Was all of this some sort of "long con" on Abby's part, to eventually trap Owen into going with her? I don't believe this to be the case. I think she fully intended to move on without him, but perhaps couldn't face being alone again after several decades of companionship. A selfish decision, but one that I can forgive due to Abby's "age". I would be far more judgmental if an adult or even an older teen was making this same decision.

From one point of view, it's absolutely vile of Abby to abduct Owen and lead him (probably) into the same kind of life Thomas had. Looking at the world through Abby's eyes, though, well... I can just hear Abby asking "Who are you to say that a girl has to live her life all alone just because she has an unusual disease? Suppose people were to say YOU have to live YOUR life alone just because your skin or your hair or your eyes are the wrong colour!? Leave me alone!"

You're right in that the film makes no attempt to show will change her ways. Indeed, I thought it was implied (in horror movie fashion) that another cycle had started. However, it's always possible that Abby could actually learn from her last relationship and try a different path, be it turning Owen or letting him go down the road.

There've been several people to "opine" that the relationship Owen will share with Abby will be "different" or "special", that it won't be the same desperate and darkly overcast bittersweet torment seen between herself and Thomas. One can pray their hearts can see something my eyes cannot.