Tuesday, August 12, 2014

HIT ME WITH YOUR BEST SHOT: Suddenly, Last Summer


This week's film for Hit me with your best shot is an adaptation of the Tennessee Williams play "Suddenly, Last Summer". It stars Elizabeth Taylor, Katharine Hepburn and Montgomery Clift and it surely put their acting talents to good use with its wordy script. The story is about the secrets surrounding a young man after his mysterious death, which are so scandalous that his mother requests a lobotomy for her niece (his presumed lover) in order to cover them up. The plot that unfolds is what I can best describe as psychological warfare. From the sinister intent of the lobotomy to the unhealthy mother-son relationship, there's a lot of crazy to go around.

In choosing my best shot, I've tried to reflect the film's madness with an image that seems like a subliminal attempt to mess with the viewer.

Click below for my favourite shot...


This shot comes from the end of the film as Catherine (Elizabeth Taylor) is finally revealing the truth behind Sebastian's death. In her flashback, we seem him running from a hoard of young boys and he passes the skeleton seen above. We soon see that it's just an illusion, but it gets you wondering if she's actually crazy or not. We're expected to assume that she's being truthful, but this simple image planted some seeds of doubt in my mind. Or maybe I'm just overanalyzing??

1 comment:

  1. i dont think you're overanalyzing. what i love about Catherine's confession is that it's still so murky. How much do we really understand about what went down? When it's all so vaguely alluded to with occassionally gutsy and grotesque specifics

    ReplyDelete