MOST people, when this came out, thought it was real. I remember that scene…pointed it out that it wasn’t open to interpretation…AAHnold paid for a mind vacation as a secret agent and got what he paid for. After the end of the movie, he woke up and went home to his wife.
Never believe anything Bill Bryson writes without checking it with a few independent sources first. He’s a fun writer, but he must have failed Fact Checking 101.
Now who’s being naïve?!
Now having a false memory of his wife being a mole undercover there to keep him from remembering his true identity, and who tried to murder him when he started remembering? That… could mess with someone’s head.
Yeah, but does he want to tie her up, now?
Naw. She’s too hot. He’d get over it quickly 
Aren’t they lost near a river? Like, they keep coming back to it?
Following a river downstream is a pretty good way to keep yourself from walking in circles and head in the general direction of civilization, which likes to build itself on rivers.
Very helpful.
One of the characters explains the beings to come at the end before we even see them.
Does the movie give any basis for thinking they were demons? I haven’t seen it in a while, but I remember it being pretty clear that they were aliens.
Even if it was true, doesn’t it just raise the question of why the water from the faucets in Mel Gibson’s house is holy water?
The little girl was drinking holy water and leaving cups everywhere? Huh.
Well, the central plot of the movie is a bizarre Rube Goldberg-esque chain of coincidences, evidently put into place by God, in order to prevent that one particular alien from killing Mel Gibson’s kid. So the film establishes the existence of an interventionist God who is, in some measure, opposed to the creatures in the movie. It’s not a *huge *leap to go from there, to the idea that the creatures opposed by God are actually demons, but it is still a leap.
A common part of this theory on the movie is that God intervenes by blessing all the waters of the Earth simultaneously, making it all into holy water so the human race can defeat the demons.
The advantage of this theory is that all the fantastic elements of the film share a common source: both the “alien invasion,” and the “miracle” at Mel’s farmhouse, are directly related. Other interpretations require two unrelated fantastic influences occurring at the same time: aliens from space, and a miraculous revelation to a former preacher.
I don’t think it’s the strongest possible interpretation of the film. It doesn’t have a satisfying explanation for the invisible object floating over (IIRC) Mexico City, for example, and the idea of turning all water into holy water is a little too interventionist for a “moves in mysterious ways” kind of deity. I wouldn’t include Signs in this thread on that basis.
I would, however, include it on the basis that a lot of people think the aliens were invading in the first place. This is clearly not the case. The aliens were raiding us. They weren’t taking any territory. They weren’t occupying any cities. They were kidnapping people, and taking them back to their ships. We don’t know why they wanted people. Are they slavers? Biologists? Chefs? We don’t have any clues. But it’s clear that they weren’t trying to rule the Earth, only steal from it.
(My own theory is that the aliens we see aren’t the aliens who built and piloted the ships. They’re another slave race, sent to gather new stock for their masters, and were specifically chosen because of their vulnerability to water: they don’t have any choice about returning to the ship, because our world is deadly to them.)
Why does God need to bless all the waters simultaneously? Can’t the former preacher make the water at his farmhouse holy at a moment’s notice?
Because the aliens aren’t just at his farmhouse. They’re all over the world.
Pulp Fiction:
Marcellus was staking out Butch’s apartment along with Vincent (filling in for Jules, since he had left the business). He had apparently just stepped out for donuts. That’s why Butch ran into him nearby, it wasn’t just some crazy coincidence.
Fried Green Tomatoes:
Mrs. Threadgoode is not Idgie.
:smack:
Where’s that thread about obvious things you never noticed in movies?
I doubt a former preacher could bless holy water, even if he was from one of the few denominations that uses or believes in it in the first place.
Yeah. In a movie where God’s most direct intervention is giving a kid asthma and having a dying woman make a cryptic remark, spontaneous and direct blessing of all the water in the world (or even all the water in a house) seems a bit out of place.
Were there people seriously arguing that this encounter was a coincidence? Seeing Marcellus holding the take-out food made it, I thought, apparent that he was just then heading to (or back to) Butch’s apartment with food for himself and Vincent.
I just rewatched part of the movie - after shooting Vincent and leaving his building, Butch heads back to the car and, overconfidently, actually drives around to the front entrance, pauses to comment smugly about how he is being underestimated, then a block later pauses at a red light only to have Marcellus (who is holding a pink box with what looks like two cups of coffee balanced on top) cross the street in front of him.
Hilarity ensues. Incidentally, the lyrics on Butch’s car radio are “It’s good to see you, I must go, I know I look a fright” at the moment Butch notices Marcellus.
I haven’t seen it in years. If she isn’t one of those two main girls, who was she?
According to the novel, she’s Idgie’s sister-in-law.