I was once in a workshop about intimacy and I remember this one quote that just stuck with me:
One Day Someone You Love, Will Do the Most Despicable Thing to You-And You Will Just Have to get Over It.
Two movies, “In the Valley of Elah” and “Before the Devil Knows Your Dead” says to me that sometimes you just can’t get over it.
Just before “In the Valley of Elah” was released I got to see this one scene, Both my Boys with Tommy Lee Jones (who I feel is an under rated actor) and Susan Sarandon and I thought to myself that the pain etched on Jones’ face was a pain that I never want to experience.
A number of the early reviews of this movie focused on it being an Antiwar flick. I saw it more about two families, both of them culpable in having the unthinkable happen. We are suppose to be safe with family, both immediate and extended family. In this case the military.
When we talk about war and the tragedies that ensue once the soldiers return home, we erroneously believe that the war is responsible, rather than the war being the thing that confirms the true nature of being. War never falls from the sky, we go to war – it never comes to us.
In Time, the Worst Things will Happen on Their Own-No Need for us to Agitate the Situation
“Before the Devil Knows Your Dead” is also about family and trust. Trust Me! We are often blinded (by closeness) when asked for our trust. This is not to say that we should not trust family or people in general, but you have to look deeply to see if you can find yourself in what is being asked of you. In this movie, one person had the chance to end the craziness before it started, but didn’t.
This family never heard the phrase “As you Sow, so Shall you Reap” or my favorite “Birds of a Feather Flock Together”
Re: “Before the Devil Knows Your Dead”
Good but infuriating movie – it was like watching an accident – I couldn't avert my eyes.
Yes! there are so many people here that could have just said "stop" – but, real life sometimes turns into that cartoon sequence where everyone/everything gets caught up in this huge snowball that careens downhill seemingly out of control. Sometimes we have to remember that assuming a "powerless" position, going along to get along, can have dire results. (Doing nothing is still a decision)
An intervention can be less painful than the alternative.