An analysis of 'The Thomas Crown Affair' ('68)

Themes from 'A Thomas Crown Affair'

Thomas Crown (played by Steve McQueen) is a thrill-seeker and a man who takes risks. At the start of the film, he hides behind a light giving instructions to a man who is one of 5 men he hires to rob a bank. His anonymity behind the light hides not just his face but also his feelings. He’s just a voice giving orders to the man facing the light who’s face and feelings are in plain view.

Vicki Anderson (played by Faye Dunaway) is an independent investigator the insurance company hires to locate the stolen money. She relies on her intuition and her ability to charm and maintain the distance necessary to do her job. The fact that she is an investigator suggests that she likes challenges and men who are somewhat aloof and mysterious. This is why she is turned off on Eddie Malone, the police detective she works with. 

When Eddie first sees her at the airport, his professional demeanor takes a backseat to desire and he greets her with a big smile. But she ignores him completely and he becomes visibly upset by it. She figures him out quickly but Thomas Crown provides her with a challenge because he keeps his feelings hidden. He’s good-looking, highly educated, a playboy, likes to gamble on the currency market, 36, divorced, and available. Her intuition tells her that he’s the mastermind of the bank heist.

The use of split screens and moving panes in the film is designed to look like the chess board Thomas and Vicki play on at his place. When they wind up sleeping together, Vicki reminds her jealous partner, Eddie, that it’s all business. Their game of chess is to see who can keep their feelings out of the affair and stay focused on business.

The pivotal scene in the film and Vicki's character arc is when Eddie shows Vicki pictures of Thomas in a restaurant with another woman. For the 1st time in the film, Vicki shows her feelings and that she is jealous. She asks Thomas, in a roundabout way, if he brings other women to his place on the beach and he tells her that the woman he was seen in the restaurant with was simply a way to remind her of what she is-- a woman 1st and an investigator 2nd.

Vicki is torn by her feelings for Thomas and recovering the money he stole from the bank. She wants him to make a deal with Eddie; Eddie, however, can't get over his jealous feelings and wants to catch Thomas more than ever. Thomas tests Vicki by telling her about his plan to rob another bank in the same fashion that he robbed the previous bank. The police stake out the cemetery where the stolen money is to be put in a trash can and later picked up by Thomas. And when the police see his Rolls Royce pull up to the trash can they surround the car but the driver isn’t Thomas. The driver gives Vicki a telegram telling her to bring the money or keep the car. He is in a jet out of the country. In the end, it is a check-mate, as both stay true to business. Thomas stays true to himself by not allowing his heart to distract him from the fact that Vicki is still a detective and still out to earn the insurance company's 10% finders fee. Him not trusting her resolves the conflict between her feelings and carrying out her job. 

Claudine (1974 film)

This is a scene by scene examination of the film 'Claudine' directed by Lester Pine. 

CLAUDINE 

Directed by John Berry
Starring James Earl Jones, Diahann Carroll, and Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs
Written by Lester Pine and Tina Pine
Music by Curtis Mayfield
Studio: Third World Cinema

Analysis:

Title 1 (3:00-7:00) (4:00)

In this scene, Claudine is getting off the bus in the suburbs to clean the home of a wealthy White couple. She is late because of the bus. Roop, the trash collector is picking up the trash and she slices a grapefruit in half and takes it to him. This is his regular route and they see each other often. He asks her for a date but she nervously declines. However, seeing him stand up to a White man who overloads his trash can changes her mind and she agrees to date Roop.

My viewpoint

Right away, we see the night and day difference in the concerns of poor blacks and well-off Whites as Claudine, played by Diahann Carroll, arrives to work and the White woman whose home she cleans on the phone in bright, gay, colorful clothing talking about lots of land and big money. We also meet Roop, played by James Earl Jones, who’s picking up the trash. His job is a metaphor, relating what he does in his job with his relationship with Claudine who, being a single Black woman with 6 children by 2 men, is considered by society as being trash. This could be racist or it could be simply implying that he sees value in Claudine.

Title (4) (8:00-12:50) (4:50)

Roop goes by Claudine’s place and meets her 6 children who pull her in 6 different directions. She is completely overwhelmed. Roop invites her to his place for dinner instead of her place where they will be alone.

My viewpoint:

Not having a man to help shoulder responsibilities, Claudine’s children are growing like weeds. Roop sees this but at this stage of the film he has not yet accepted any role in their lives.

Not having a positive male influence also makes the children susceptible to negative self images. The children have the television on a Tarzan movie and are cheering for Tarzan who is battling Black Africans. The Black Africans--as Claudine and her 6 children-- are looked upon negatively by this society.

Title (5) 18:12-22:15) (4:03)

At Roop’s place, Claudine finds rest and relief. Roop is surprised to learn that Claudine is 36 years old. She bristles at his insinuation that she is some kind of whore like the people at the Welfare office treats her. Roop calms her down and lays his own cards on the table. He has 3 children by 2 ex wives in 2 states. Claudine gives him a taste of his own medicine: the difference between her and him is that at least she sees her kids; he doesn’t see his kids at all

My viewpoint:

This scene shows the lengths men go through to protect their dignity even if it means leaving their families. Men have a low tolerance for the disrespect Black women submit to dealing with the Welfare agency. Later in the film, we see this double-standard on Roop’s part when he is in the Welfare office and is asked to submit to Welfare rules. Roop has a fit and storms out of the office. This is a testament to how Black women humble themselves for their children

Title 4 (6)(27:24-33:45) (6:21)

After their 1st date, Claudine is questioned by her children for being out so late. That evening, Roop, goes to Claudine’s apartment to take her out. Charles warns Roop not to hurt his mother.

My viewpoint: 

Roop is beginning to do small things for Claudine’s children but you can see that he would rather not be bothered with them at this point.

Title (8)(34:50-37:31) (2:41)

The social worker from the Welfare office makes a surprise visit on Claudine and the kids who hide everything (toasters, irons, etc) before opening the door to let her in. The social worker warns Claudine not to be hiding anything that could be deducted from her welfare check.

My viewpoint:

Title 6 (9) (37:35-40:32) (2:58)

Charlene comes home late and Claudine confronts her. Abdullah, Charlene says, took her out to the Flamingo and introduced her to people and taught her how to 'hold her liquor.'

My viewpoint:

Charlene tells her mother that she is nothing and this low self esteem is attributed to the men who have abandoned Claudine and her children. This also explains the decision by the film’s writers to cast Roop as a trash collector because Claudine, like garbage, is discarded by the men in her life and American society.

Title (9) (43:12-50:24) (7:12)

Roop has a fatherly talk with one of Claudine's sons who says that he wants to be invisible. He shows Roop a blank sheet of paper and when Roop asks what it is the boy says a family, an invisible family.

My viewpoint: 

Roop’s conscience is beginning to bother him in this scene . Roop is probably thinking about his own children whom he has no involvement with. Later, Roop walks the neighborhood looking for Claudine’s middle boy who has dropped out of school. Roop finds the boy with a group of older men shooting dice. That night, Roop and Claudine go by a neighborhood community center to find Charles who has not been home in 3 days. Charles hangs out at the Center with neighborhood activists. A man Charles associates with is there and Claudine and Charlene ask him of Charles’ whereabouts. The man blows them off, rather casually and rather disrespectfully. However, when Roop steps in forcefully and the man becomes compliant. Magically, Charles appears out of thin air.

Title (11) (50:26-53:51) (3:25) 

The social worker from the Welfare office makes another surprise visit on Claudine and finds Roop there hiding in a closet. At first, Claudine and the kids hide everything Roop bought them like irons and toasters—small things. The Welfare woman speaks down to Roop, asking such questions whether he lived there or not; did he contribute anything to Claudine’s family; and “there was a time when we’d ask to use the bathroom to see if there was a razor in the cabinet.” Claudine goes off on the caseworker and orders the kids to bring everything Roop bought them out into the open.

My viewpoint:

Roop is put on the spot as far as where he stands with Claudine and the kids. He left 2 ex-wives with kids and now he finds himself having to make a similar decision. The trash can that was too heavy for him to dump earlier has a symbolic meaning tied to Claudine who is also too “heavy” to dump. He loves her but in order to keep her he has to also love her kids, all 6—a very heavy situation. On one hand, the Welfare system wants Claudine off the rolls and on the other hand, Roop  doesn’t want the system pushing her and her kids off on him. She is regarded as trash, as something enjoyed by men, used by White people to clean their homes, and now simply discarded by both society and her man.

(from Wikipedia: AFDC and ‘The Right’s Campaign Against Welfare’ by Jean Hardisty)

"AFDC or Welfare as we know it today, was originally created for White widows and their children and later expanded to include single White women with children who were expected not to work. Black mothers who had always been in the labor force were not considered eligible to receive benefits. Plus, many states conditioned welfare benefits on the sexual morality of the woman and man-of-the-house rules to disqualify Black women from getting benefits. The push for Black equality in the Sixties, Welfare Rights organizing and several Supreme court decisions outlawing state mandates opened the welfare rolls to Black women. This was around the time that the Republican Party demonized the welfare recipient as immoral, lazy and irresponsible. The federal government authorized case workers, supervisors, and administrators with discretion to determine who received aid and how much."

Title (11) (56:35-1:02:14) (5:39) 

Roop and Claudine go by the Welfare office to see how getting married will impact her benefits. Two caseworkers, both female (1 White and 1 Black) take Roop and Claudine through a maze of rules and regulations. Room gets frustrated. He leaves the office in disgust and decides to move Claudine and her children into his apartment. But just as he is about to tell her kids of his plan to marry their mother, someone knocks on his door and a man hands him a letter from the Court charging him with ‘willful neglect’ in underpaying his child support.

My viewpoint:

Just when Roop takes full responsibility for Claudine and her kids he suffers another setback. You notice how calm the children are with a man who loves them and their mother? But when she had them by herself they were very unhappy. Once again in this scene, Claudine’s dream of a husband and a father for her children is put on hold as Roop has to resolve issues in his past.

Title (13) (1:03:23-1:06:35) (3:12) 

Roop cracks under the pressure, drinking and snapping at Claudine because the Courts are garnishing his paycheck. He threatens to leave town to avoid paying. Finally, he breaks down and cries like a baby in front of Claudine.

My viewpoint:

This is not an atypical scene but a very typical one among Black men in these situations. Roop really does want to do the right thing but he still has to pay for the 3 kids from his prior relationships. The irony is that now Roop--the man--finds out first-hand what it is like to bear the burden of others depending on him for food and shelter. Now, he knows what Claudine is going through raising 6 kids by herself and what the mothers of his own 3 children are going through. This pressure drives him to drink alcohol. Now, the metaphor of the overloaded trash can is completely understood, why Roop told the White man that the can was too heavy and to take half the bricks out of the can and put them in another can. The bricks in the can are responsibilities, in Roop’s case, his kids from his previous marriages and Claudine’s kids. But Roop is now asked to carry all the bricks in a single can instead of 2 cans and it seems too much for him, for now.

Title (14) ( (1:08:58-1:10:18) (1:20) 

Claudine and the kids throw a big Father’s Day party but Roop doesn’t show up.

My viewpoint: 

Once again, Claudine and her kids are abandoned. Roop has completely vanished. His phone is disconnected. This scene makes me wonder how often women like Claudine who have to raise children by themselves contemplate just simply running away. There’s nothing like a mother’s love for her children and the things she’ll deal with to take care of them. But now, Roop’s whereabouts are unknown as stress has overtaken his mind.

Title (15) (1:13:03-1:16:00) (2:57)

Charles is angry that his mother has 6 children and tells her that he wishes that she had aborted him. Also, Charlene is pregnant.

My viewpoint: 

The self-hatred of Claudine’s children is tied to the men who left her, including Roop whose whereabouts are a mystery. Charlene’s low self worth comes from seeing how men abandon her mother.


Title (17) (1:18:27-1:20:15) (1:48) 

Charles has a vasectomy so that he can’t bring any kids into the world and leave them as Charlene had been abandoned with kids by the men she loved.

My viewpoint:

Charles’ self-hatred is conscious, unlike his sister Charlene whose self-hatred is unconsciously expressed through the way she dresses and the way that she allows herself to be manipulated by her boyfriend. Charles projects every man that leaves his mother onto himself. And the fact that he emasculates himself explains the duality between himself and his sister Charlene, for her name is the inverse of Charles’s name, hence, his vasectomy. 

Title (18)(1:22:07-1:27:32) (1:46) 

Charles finds Roop in a neighborhood bar drunk. Charles punches him in the mouth and Roop embraces him. Later, Charles goes by Claudine's place to apologize to her and the kids for not showing up for his Father’s Day Party.

My viewpoint:


Roop hates himself. As a Black man he feels helpless over his life, helpless to care for those he loves, which is the root of why he is drinking and why he ran away rather than face his situation. He feels like garbage--like what he does for a living--but Charles' punch in the mouth brings him to his senses. Afterwards, Roop goes by Claudine’s apartment and explains to them why he cut out like he did, that like most men who loved their woman and kids, it hurt him to not have the money to take care of them like he wanted. They make amends and agree to get married.

What was 'Apocalypse Now' really about?

The main theme of 'Apocalypse Now, Redux!'

"The deeper Willard goes up the Nung River and the more he disconnects himself from reality and his humanity the more he connects with Kurtz. Everything Willard experiences on his journey from the film crew to the usage of drugs, the playboy bunnies, rock and roll, and even the French rubber plantation are metaphors for Kurtz’ disconnection and escape from not only society and his command (or God) but his disconnection from reality. This explains Kurtz escaping to live in a remote jungle which is a metaphor for his disconnection from reality and humanity and the liberation of his animal side. Captain Willard, at the beginning of the film, is himself disconnected from humanity because he’d rather be in the jungles of Vietnam than to go home to his wife. This is the meaning of the montage at the beginning where we see Willard in his room and images of a burning jungle. When he gets his mission to find Kurtz, he gets to know Kurtz, sees what he saw, and, in the process, Willard reconnects with reality and his own humanity because out of all the people he’s killed for the CIA, Kurtz is the only one he learns to identify with and gets to know by what he sees traveling up the Nung River. 

By the end of the film, we see Kurtz as a god over the Montagnards, the indigenous people of the Central Highlands. This jungle represents man’s basic nature, our lowest and most basic urges and desires that disconnects us from humanity, God, civilization and morality. This disconnection explains things that seem out of place in the film like the film director telling soldiers not to look into the camera and the weird behavior of Colonel Kilgore who breaks out his surfboard to surf in the middle of a war-zone. 

The “dark side” the general at Nha Trang refers to is the lower levels of our nature, our hidden desires that reveal themselves when we completely disconnect ourselves from both reality and humanity.

To understand the transformation Kurtz undergoes, going from US soldier who follows orders (or obeys others) to becoming a god in a remote Cambodian jungle, a good analogy would be a woman blessed with beauty. Women are biologically designed to attract men, which gives them a certain amount of power over men. But this power in possession of a woman with exceptional beauty is amplified and, without proper moral and spiritual restraints, could be utilized negatively. Men (and women) worship beauty.  This is what I believe transforms Kurtz into a God. He is exceptionally trained and talented (and he knows this), has won every medal one can imagine. His superiority over others (and even his own commanders) is what leads to his corruption, as the General at Nha Trang points out “We all have a breaking point,” and “It must be tempting to be God to these primitives.” This is Kurtz’s weakness, his pulling away from moral restraints, spirituality, and God and succumbing to his primal nature or animal side as described by Madame Sarrault at the French Plantation.

At the end of the film, Willard kills Kurtz as a ritual sacrifice for the crimes he committed. This sequence starts out as 1) baptism where Willard rises out of the water, his face done in tribal paint to look like an animal; 2) Kurtz offers himself up to be killed as the natives sacrifice a water buffalo to their god; 3) Willard leaves the jungle, or the life of an assassin, and returns up the Nung River to civilization meaning that he is reconnecting with his humanity and God. The final image in the film is Willard's painted animal-like face superimposed with the face of the native's statue of God, which is a metaphor for Willard reconnecting with God or command.