Alan and Clara
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vxronin — 19 years ago(February 02, 2007 02:02 AM)
Well i'm really torn on this. The relationship between ALan and Clara is certainly the most interesting relationship in the film for me, only because it isn't so clear.
Several times in the move, references are made to the effect of: "Well Clara, how long are you willing to wait [for Alan]?"
I kinda take that to mean that Alan is psychosexually repressed by his mother. At the beginning of the film, Alan is sick sitting in a chair speaking to Clara, and his mother abruptly disrupts them and (for no good reason) basically tells Clara to take a hike she politely leaves but its clear she is annoyed and Alan is distressed. I think this scene is the key.
I'm leaning towards he isn't gay. And the references in the film to "how long is Clara willing to wait". I take that to mean how long is she willing to wait until his mother dies because that's the only way she and Alan can ever be together. His mother controls every part of his life and doesn't want a woman to take her away from him, and he's obviously feeling guilty about leaving his mother and wont ever do it.
It really isn't clear whether he is or he isn't I'm curious to hear how you guys interpret the scene I mentioned above, that's an important scene. -
Somerset_25 — 19 years ago(February 11, 2007 08:09 PM)
I kinda take that to mean that Alan is psychosexually repressed by his mother. At the beginning of the film, Alan is sick sitting in a chair speaking to Clara, and his mother abruptly disrupts them and (for no good reason) basically tells Clara to take a hike she politely leaves but its clear she is annoyed and Alan is distressed. I think this scene is the key.
You're right on target with this scene, although you leave out a key elementAlan's mother doesn't disrupt Clare and Alan and tells her to beat it for no good reason; she comes in exactly when Clara kisses him. It's obvious that she represses him in some way, even if she is unconscious to the fact, and even if he allows it.
That being said, I'm siding with the others here who think that Alan is gay. In this day and age it isn't fair to assume that being a mama's boy automatically makes a man gay, but back then, that was usually the way Hollywood got the idea across. The general idea at the time was that homosexuality was a mental disease, a perversion, something akin to incest or the like. Even today, when a guy is gay a lot of people come to the conclusion that his mother coddled him too much in his youth. I took the "How long is Clara willing to wait?" questions to mean, "How long is she willing to wait to marry him?" I never saw Alan's mother dying or living really having any bearing on their plans. -
vxronin — 19 years ago(February 15, 2007 11:10 PM)
Somerset 25, okay I can't remember when Alans mother first enters that scene. But, if I recall correctly (and I believe I am), Alans mother enters that scene to tell Clara to take a hike BEFORE the kiss. Clara, then annoyed that she's just been told to leave (and that Alan makes no effort to prevent it) begins to leave and as she does she makes a final act of defiance by kissing Alan on his cheek it's a "screw you" to Alan's mother (whose standing right beside his chair).
I interpret the scene as a fight over Alan. Clara wants Alan and so does his mother and they are fighting over him. Meanwhile, Alan is reduced to spectator because he has affection for Clara, but absolute loyalty to his mother. He isn't willing to side with either, he's paralyzed.
I'll cite another scene which leads me to believe Alan isn't gay. The dinner table scene. Here, where everyone is present Alan is Clara's dinner date for the evening and is sitting next to Clara's father, Will Varner (Orson Wells). Orson is drunk and is giving Alan a hard time, he's insulting him and attempting to degrade him. Alan is a stalwart character, he is by definition a perfect "Southern Gentleman". Alan doesn't get upset, but does defends himself.
The battle at that dinner table reveals deeper insight into the relationship between Alan and his mother. Orson makes reference that Alan never knew his father, (who abandon him and his mother) and that it's just him and his mother living there alone. I think this scene establishes that Alan was raised mainly by his mother, that he has been both father and son to his mother. Thus, the overprotection by his mother who never wants anyone to take him away and why Alan (again, the perfect Southern Gentlemen) won't ever leave his mother.
What do you think? -
loveoldmovies22 — 19 years ago(March 01, 2007 09:40 AM)
It was not unusual at all for a man to live with his mother at that time if the father was gone. Even if they didn't share the same home, he would have helped provide for her. It was actually seen as rather bad form and ungrateful, if he didn't. Alan makes the comment at the dinner table that his mother is alone. So, Alan has a sister Agnes and a mother to take care of. It seems that their family was at one time rich and now down on their luck, living off the inheritance (what is left of it).
Even so, most mothers would have welcomed a daughter-in-law and the prospect of grandchildren. The usual arrangement would have been that the mother would have lived with them or at least nearby. Alan's mother obviously does not want any daughter-in-law.
So, Alan has enough integrity to realize that this would be a terrible future for Clara. Whether he is gay or not, his mother has crippled him badly and he knows it. Agnes seems to have avoided this, at least partially. -
Jalea — 18 years ago(July 04, 2007 03:03 PM)
I think Alan was gay. I did not realize it right away, because it is played real subtle. However, it is also clear that Alan's mom had the apron strings tied real tight.
Clara saw what she wanted to see, because Alan represented everything her father wasn't; sensitive, cultured, educated and from a well respected family. Considering how lovely and passionate Clara was, it seemed like any healthly normal male would feel attracted. Also, her family was rich (new money maybe) but a rich and powerful force in the community nonethless.
Alan like Clara, but he did not love Clara and he lead her on for years. Maybe he did it to cover up the truth, who knows? Six years is a long time to lead someone on. At least Clara finally confronted him.
He could have handled Varner's confrontation differently, the man disrespected his mother and broke their furniture. Our last glimpse of Alan is watching him climbing up the stairs of his home and he is walking funny (no pun intended). -
chinaskinotes — 18 years ago(July 12, 2007 05:38 PM)
Just to weigh in Doesn't Ben say to Clara something to the effect that if she's waiting for Alan, she's got her money in the wrong bank. This certainly implies that at least Alan is percieved by others as being gay which in the south, and Faulkner's world, that's as damning as actually being gay. There is definitely a need for the men to be, as Varner puts it, 'stud horses' that is something that Jodie is also struggling under. Anyone who doesn't fit this manly man role is certainly an outcast. There is so much sexual repression in this movie that it does make sense for Alan to be a repressed homosexual. I guess I just assumed he was without really questioning it. It was wonderfully acted all around.
Chinaski
I don't hate people. I just like it a lot better when they're not around. -
Xeresa6 — 17 years ago(July 06, 2008 11:58 AM)
I have to agree in a lot of respects to your comment about Alan not being gay.
The scene where Will is rudely taunting Alan about his closeness with his mother brought about this dialogue when Alan replies that his mother is widowed and relies on his help and support.
Will: " Your Daddy ain't dead! He just up and ran off years ago."
Alan: " The result is the same. My mother is alone!'
Will: " She's not alone. She has you,Alanshe sure has you!"
Alan: " I try to to my best!"
Will: " Not around her you don't!"
I think that Alan's mother has emotionally neutered him. I have often wondered if Alan's father was more like a better-mannered counterpart of Will Varner, and that Mrs. Steward was determined that neither of her children were going to take after their father in anyway it is clear that she is a controlling person who has no intention of letting them escape her control.
Mabel Anderson gave a memorably nuanced performances in the few scenes allotted to her. It is also clear that poor Agnes has been given short shrift in the family heirarchy.
Agnes seems to have a more healthy and down to earth interest in life. As she phrases it to Clara, her goals are to " have a strong, healthy man to love. To put children in a bath, make ice cream, have supper ready for her husband, and think about what the night is going to bring!" Agnes is a normal girl with normal needs and hates the wasted non-life she has to endure with her family.
I kept wishing for Agnes to meet that "strong,healthy man" before the end of the movie, and perhaps even elope with him to show a counterpoint to Alan's being trapped by his possesive mother! -
ncgraham — 11 years ago(April 10, 2014 08:27 PM)
The general idea at the time was that homosexuality was a mental disease, a perversion, something akin to incest or the like.
And actually, in a lot of film and literature in the time, incestuous feelings and homosexuality seem to go hand in hand. The main example I can think of is Bruno in Patricia Highsmith's
Strangers on a Train
(the mother in the book is quite different than in the Hitchcock movie), but I know there are others. -
vinidici — 18 years ago(February 22, 2008 08:27 PM)
The first conclusion I reached is that Alan was gay, but I think there's a second alternativewhich is, quite actually, pretty disturbing, but not unheard of.
Think, "The Manchurian Candidate," with Angela Lansbury as the mother of Laurence Harvey (the title character). Compare Alan's mother with the "mother from hell" portrayed by Lansbury. Both mothers are very controling and manipulative of their sons. Both sons are psychological victims of their mothers.
Damn, I don't wanna go any further with this; I think everyone gets my drift, anyway. It may, unfortunately, be an even more credible sizing-up of Alan than is the idea of his being homosexual -
louis-king — 17 years ago(April 11, 2008 06:30 PM)
Remember how Alan interrupted the picknic basket scene between Clara & Ben?
Why would he confront Ben so pointedly if he were gay? If he were gay he wouldn't have cared enough to risk getting beaten up by Ben. -
wirenwit — 17 years ago(July 02, 2008 04:13 AM)
He is gay. Look at the tag lines for this movie:
"The red-hot lowdown on a southern familythat people talked about in whispers!"
"A story of the Modern South!"
"NOTHING - BUT NOTHING !WILL BE WITHHELD!when this searing expose of this Southern family comes boldly to the screen!" -
butaneggbert — 10 years ago(July 26, 2015 09:11 PM)
He sees Clara as his property - understood in the community for some time - and Ben as lower class than he is.
Alan is a rich, idle man, aware that his lack of masculinity marks him as flawed in that culture. He idealizes what he perceived as Clara's pristine chastity - and backs off whenever she evinces any sign of healthy sexuality.
Ben is a very real threat to Alan, especially if Alan is sexually repressed and/or gay. Ben is lusty and superbly masculine - everything Alan knows is valued, and knows he himself isn't.
If he believes Clara is chaste, he can't bear to think of dirty Ben touching her. If he's aware Clara is frustrated, he can't risk Ben's overt sexuality around her.
He simultaneously looks down on Ben as an uncultured working-class lowlife, and as someone he wants a long, long way away from "his" Clara. -
MTulliver — 17 years ago(July 06, 2008 04:44 PM)
I also got that impression. And I think the reason why his mother was so possessive was that she did not want people to know her son was gay. She didn't want any girls to get close enough to him to find out.
She'd prefer people to just think he is a Momma's Boy. -
HillieBoliday — 15 years ago(March 21, 2011 01:37 PM)
Here I am 3 years later.but I think you have hit the nail on the head!!
In southern culture, or any culture for that fact,
having granchildren was a credit to the family legacy.
However a "momma's boy" Alan might have been, or how controlling his
mother might have been; being able to continue the family generations
was and still is extremely important.
I have always thought that Alan was gay, and his mother was going to
great lengths with this "momma's boy" charade, to keep that fact hidden.
Having a son that was gay, was equally scandalous, as being the one
who is discovered as gaythus why I think she did everything she could
to keep that fact hidden.
"OOOI'M GON' TELL MAMA!" -
gs-web — 16 years ago(September 12, 2009 07:42 PM)
I think he was gay - and of course there is nothing wrong with that - but back then it was a mystery. This film was made in 1958 from a William Faulkner novel, so you have to read between the lines.
Alan was from an old, wealthy family and a different social strata, so it was difficult for Clara to read him. She kept thinking that he was a courtly gentleman and so she kept waiting for him to grab her and give her a kiss. Thats the point - he was not ever going to grab her and give her a kiss. Gay men don't want to grab a woman and give her a sexy kiss and it leaves a lot of room for a woman, especially many years ago, to drift along in a relationship with no future.
In the beginning of the film Clara is sitting on the front porch talking about men with her girlfriend. Neither of them have a beau and Clara goes over to Alan's house shortly after that conversation and tells him she is beginning to worry, because a girl wonders when men aren't coming around.
Here are the reasons I think Alan was gay:- He never gives Clara an explanation for why he isn't good for her, but he tells her he is no good for her. He is from one of the oldest, wealthiest families in the area, so why is he no good for her? Because he is gay!
- He never grabs her and lays a big one on her. Why? Because he is gay!
- Clara's father calls him a sissy when he goes over to Alan's house to make the wedding arrangements. Why? Because he is gay and the father finally figured it out. Also, don't miss the dichotomy of the fact that Alan doesn't make things clear to Clara and then Clara doesn't make things clear to her father - but the father is old and wily and figures it out when he is face to face with Alan and his mother.
- Thats why the father introduces the character of Ben Quick as a potential alternate groom for Clara - because he is a lusty, heterosexual male and Clara won't have to stand around for 6 or 7 years wondering how he feels.
And, finally, its probably much clearer in the book, which I haven't read.
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kaskait — 14 years ago(May 06, 2011 12:39 PM)
I've had the notion that Alan may have been homosexual. But there are so many various factors working in the film against this pair.
One of the main reasons, unspoken but shown loud and clear, was the class issue. Clara was definitely NOT from a blue blood family. And her father is just a step up from the criminal class. She is not someone Alan would marry nor would his family accept a marriage to her.
I definitely had the feeling that he kept Clara on the leash as a form of rebellion against his mother and the rest of the family.
As for Clara, I think she liked the idea of possibly being a member of an old blood family. That fantasy kept her running after Alan when it was clear he wasn't that serious about her.