The movie, Mother & Child, is about three women, Lucy, Elizabeth, and Karen, who's stories have to do with being a mother in some way. The film follows the three women and their challenges with adoption and pregnancy. Karen is played by Annette Bening. Karen is a 50- year old who is struggling over giving up her child at the age of 14. She seems to be full of hate and struggles accepting people into her life. Elizabeth is the daughter Karen, whom she gave up at 14, and has never met. Elizabeth is played by Naomi Watts. She is a persistent, controlling, carefree lawyer who just wants to do her own thing. She has a sexual relationship with her boss where she gets pregnant. While giving birth she dies, and her child is left for adoption. Lucy is played by Kerry Washington. She and her husband have been trying for a baby for four years when they decide on adoption. When her husband backs out and leaves her, she decides to continue with the adoption. This scene is very similar to the movie Juno (Reitman, J.) . Where the father is not ready to adopt but the mother is. Lucy still wants to adopt but is heartbroken when the mother backs out. A new baby girl comes up and Lucy adopts her, the baby that Elizabeth has left behind. Karen finds peace in the end with her husband, but becoming a grandmother-figure to Lucy's child, her biological granddaughter.
The theme of the film is about a mother's love. The quote used at the end of the movie and the beginning is, "it's the time spent together that counts, not blood" (Garcia, R.). This is true to the film because in the end, all three women dealt with the adoption process and loving a child that is not there, or giving up a child that is their own and still loving it. Lucy struggled when she adopted her new baby. She said that she cannot love her because she is not hers. She felt that someone just handed her a baby and she was not connected. When Lucy's mother stepped in to help her, she told her to step up because she is that child's mother. Lucy learned to love the child as if it were her own. Karen struggled her whole life with giving her child up for adoption; she felt that the world hated her for giving up her baby. She wrote to her daughter every day, and dreamed about her every night. Once she came to terms that what she did nearly 40 years ago was right for her baby, she began to feel love again. We saw her grow as a person.
The angle of the camera was excellent. I felt that each shop captured the emotions the characters where feeling. The camera was not just capturing the scene but the expressions and the way the characters felt. There were not significant lighting effects I noticed except for a few. When Karen sleeps with her ex-boyfriend, whom she had the child with; the lighting and scene became blurry; almost as signifying that she should forget the past because it is all a blur from years ago. The producers did an excellent job at connecting the story lines together and becoming one. Although it started out as three separate women struggling separate lives, in the end they were all connected by the love of adoption and being a mother.
References Boggs, J. & Petrie, J. (2008). The art of watching films. New York, NY: The McGraw-Hill Garcia, R. (Director). (2009). Mother and Child (Motion Picture). Reitman, J. (Director). (2007). Juno (Motion Picture).
The theme of the film is about a mother's love. The quote used at the end of the movie and the beginning is, "it's the time spent together that counts, not blood" (Garcia, R.). This is true to the film because in the end, all three women dealt with the adoption process and loving a child that is not there, or giving up a child that is their own and still loving it. Lucy struggled when she adopted her new baby. She said that she cannot love her because she is not hers. She felt that someone just handed her a baby and she was not connected. When Lucy's mother stepped in to help her, she told her to step up because she is that child's mother. Lucy learned to love the child as if it were her own. Karen struggled her whole life with giving her child up for adoption; she felt that the world hated her for giving up her baby. She wrote to her daughter every day, and dreamed about her every night. Once she came to terms that what she did nearly 40 years ago was right for her baby, she began to feel love again. We saw her grow as a person.
The angle of the camera was excellent. I felt that each shop captured the emotions the characters where feeling. The camera was not just capturing the scene but the expressions and the way the characters felt. There were not significant lighting effects I noticed except for a few. When Karen sleeps with her ex-boyfriend, whom she had the child with; the lighting and scene became blurry; almost as signifying that she should forget the past because it is all a blur from years ago. The producers did an excellent job at connecting the story lines together and becoming one. Although it started out as three separate women struggling separate lives, in the end they were all connected by the love of adoption and being a mother.
References Boggs, J. & Petrie, J. (2008). The art of watching films. New York, NY: The McGraw-Hill Garcia, R. (Director). (2009). Mother and Child (Motion Picture). Reitman, J. (Director). (2007). Juno (Motion Picture).