Ordinary People: Part 2

We started back up with "Ordinary People" with a phone call for his mother. When she started laughing on the phone, Conrad has a flashback of a time when his brother was living and his mother laughing. This was a sign that told the audience that Conrad’s mother scarcely laughs anymore, especially at home. For the first time, on this portion of the movie, we see the father having a flashback. He remembers a time when Conrad and Buck were arguing over a sweater. Then it skips to when Conrad, in a body suit, was being put into the ambulance. The father then starts to see the same psychiatrist as Conrad. He tells Dr. Burger that Conrad and his mother were too much alike and they didn’t connect. This is true for many people that are a lot alike, because they end up competing for the same attention.

Conrad quit the swim team and it was about a month before his parents knew. His mother found out through someone else. This scene was very dramatic and a lot that was kept in surfaces. The mother did not visit Conrad for the four months he was in the hospital. She was going to Spain and Portugal, this also shows her selfishness. Also a line that went unfinished by the mother shows that she believes that Conrad was the reasoning of Buck’s death. The husband reveals that the mother doesn’t show affection to Conrad but really loved her first born; I wonder if it was like this when he was still alive. The father asks if she would go see Dr. Burger and she dislikes the idea.

When Conrad takes the girl out from school on a date she asks him did trying to kill himself hurt. Conrad said it was like falling into a hole that keeps getting bigger and you eventually become the hole and its no longer scary. This was a very deep line that I really didn’t understand. I don't know what method Conrad used to try to kill himself, so his comparison to a hole is completely random. It was wierd way to put it, but probably the best and only way he knew how to explain it. Much more is surfacing in this movie and I can’t wait to get the entire story out so I can have a better understanding.