The only thing I didn't understand
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cathy-creswell — 11 years ago(October 22, 2014 07:51 AM)
The Colonel is a repressed gay man. He saw his son through the window in Lesters garage. He misunderstood what Ricky was doing. He was really rolling a joint, but at the Colonels viewpoint it looked as if Ricky is giving Lester oral sex. After the Colonel goes ape beep mad on his son, he makes a very emotional visit to Lesters garage where he finally acts on his gay feelings. The rebuff
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GrtOne41 — 11 years ago(October 27, 2014 10:06 AM)
Also, his exterior image is that of a tough as nails, gay-hating ex-marine. He removed that cloak when he tried to kiss Lester and Lester saw him for who he truly was. When Lester rejected him, Col. Fitts knew that Lester was likely the only other person on Earth who knew his secret and he had to be silenced.
Had Col. Fitts not killed Lester, in his mind Lester could have told Ricky or who knows who about him being a closet homosexual which would have ruined his image and in the Col.'s mind demeaned him as a man. That combined with the anger over being rejected led to him deciding to murder Lester in a fit of rage. -
Lester_Burnham_Risen — 11 years ago(October 27, 2014 05:08 PM)
he coulda just got a horse and gone up to Brokeback Mountain
http://www.kindleflippages.com/ablog/ -
marhefka — 11 years ago(February 07, 2015 02:53 AM)
@cathy.
I'm one of these people who after a movie is over while talking to other movie goers will say something like: Oh, so that's what happened. I never really understood who the killer was. The movie shows a man with a white t-shirt covered with blood entering his room. I really didn't understand that scene. I just thought it was Lester in some kind of a flashback. Now, after reading your comment and watching it again with the tilt of my screen adjusted, I realize it was the Colonel.
So, even though it wasn't your intention - thanks. -
PhoenixRising1980 — 10 years ago(June 30, 2015 10:01 PM)
Actually the reason he killed Lester was as a way to "punish" his homosexual desires in a sense, since he had been repressing them. They are embodied in Lester, since seeing Lester would always remind him of his repressed homosexual desires (even though Lester said he wasn't gay). He was purging his fixation by killing Lester.
The reason he gets mad at and beats Ricky is because he thought Ricky was expressing his own repressed desires for male sex. Frank hated himself because he saw homosexuality as wrong, but he still desired it. So seeing his son indulge in it (or so he thought), triggered those angry feelings of self hatred. He was just projecting it onto others a really horrible, horrible man.
I think the real reason he tried to make out with Lester in the first place is pretty complex. When Ricky left, seemingly a homosexual, Frank snapped. His mind was in such turmoil by the repressed desires, he HAD to let them out or he'd be headed for a straight jacket it was like a pressure cooker being released. The argument with his son triggered it, so he had to do something about it. Frank had nothing left. His wife was basically a vegetable, and his son was apparently gay and never coming back so he had nothing left to lose by kissing Lester and giving in to his extremely repressed desires. -
Lester_Burnham_Risen — 10 years ago(July 01, 2015 09:34 PM)
he makes a very emotional visit to Lesters garage where he finally acts on his gay feelings.
So why didn't he go for his dick in that case
like you didn't see Ennis mucking about - just straight up where the sun don't shine.
I don't see Col F as a real poofter.
http://www.kindleflippages.com/ablog/ -
iancockbill — 9 years ago(May 18, 2016 05:08 AM)
hi cathy,i always loved this movie as i think many people see things in it that so closely mirror our own lives particularly as i am the same age as lester when it was released,i am not disagreeing on your opinion of the colonels actions but i always thought he did it because he loved his son and was appalled at the the thought of him prostituting himself for lester and in his twisted emotional state offered himself hoping that his son would be free,then tormented by his rejection by lester and the shame he felt killed lester because of his humiliation
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temerrit — 11 years ago(November 03, 2014 10:10 AM)
The way I saw the scene was that he was NOT a homosexual.
He tried to kiss Lester because he wanted to understand and/or have a connection to his son, who he thought was gay.
The reason I think he really shot Lester was because he might have considered him a predator to his son, who he was misguided in trying to protect -
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poem — 11 years ago(March 27, 2015 03:45 AM)
Thats a possible, but very unlikely interpretation.
We heterosexual men dont feel the motivation to find out "how homosexuals feel", even less by kissing other men. Also, the father isnt trying to understand his son. He is trying to force his son into the same repressed kind of personality he himself is.
I find the theory that he is repressed gay much easier and logical. He secretly hates himself for being gay, and he hates Lester because now Lester knows he's gay. Thus he has to kill Lester, to kill the person who found out.
You shall have no other Kates before Kate Winslet.