A good biographical proof that our society is trained from birth to blame and demonize mentally ill people. The fact that the daughter appears so cold and annoyed and angry with her mother, who was clinically and very seriously ill, is extremely disheartening. She had schizophrenia. The daughter seemingly willingly forgot about what a model good mother she had been with her all the while she was growing up in the subsequent years she became ill. Good case of "get while the getting's good" and when it wasn't, she hightailed it out of there emotionally. I grew up with a girl whose mom was schizophrenic. She did embarrassing stuff too that she couldn't help...and school kids talked about it. Not once did this friend of mine behave like this woman's daughter. Not once did she behave embarrassed or cold inregard to her mother. Her mom was simply ill and couldn't help it.
Reviews
2 Reviews
God Knows Where I Am
(2016)
Well done drama...but sad and drawn out.
10 November 2018
Warning: Spoilers
Jacob's Ladder
(I) (1990)
("Spoiler" alert) Here's what it is...
14 June 2009
I have watched this movie quite a few times over the years, and there are some things I am convinced of. In summary, the whole movie is what takes place in Jacob's mind as he is dying from his wound in Vietnam.
It is common knowledge that the mind does funny things when a person is dying. Everything we see in the movie does have connections with Jacob's life before he went to Vietnam, but his dying mind spun these different scenarios around with threads attached to reality kind of like, "What would my life had been if..." Take his second wife (some say wife, I thought it was just his live-in girlfriend). He worked with her at the post office, so he knew her before he entered Vietnam. Perhaps he had had unholy thoughts about this attractive woman when he was married to his first wife. Thus, the scenario spins out about what his life would have been like if he'd have ended up with this woman. I believe his son did die before he went into Vietnam, thus seeing him at the very end and his son walking him up into heaven when he finally accepts his own death. His divorce from his wife may have already happened before Vietnam, or may have been on the verge of happening while he was there. His dying mind wonders if she still loves him, or perhaps knows this already and therefore this is in his thoughts.
He was bayonetted by one of his own troop members who was freaking out on whatever drug the food that they were previously eating was laced with. Thus, Jacob's dying mind tries to figure this whole thing out as to why his troop members freaked out like they did, leading up to one of them stabbing him in his drug-induced rage. Jacob sees his friend's face before he falls, and sees the man's shocked look and knows that the man was not in his right mind and didn't mean what he had done. His mind spins the tale of what would happen if he survived, how would this affect him and his friends and would they be able to fight this in court to bring the culprit (the army) to justice?
Kind of like a feverish mind, he sees impossible things like demons and the "shaking headed" man. All from a mind that is slowly dying. We've all had a fever and had crazy dreams resulting from it. He even has a fever that almost kills him in these fantasies, tying in with his dying brain. Even though he keeps flashing back and forth between reality and his feverish fantasies, he deep down knows he is dying.
Then at the end he finally does die, and is then at peace with his little boy he lost before.
These are just some of the answers I've figured out from watching the movie many times.
A great story. I had a good time trying to piece it together - figuring it out.
It is common knowledge that the mind does funny things when a person is dying. Everything we see in the movie does have connections with Jacob's life before he went to Vietnam, but his dying mind spun these different scenarios around with threads attached to reality kind of like, "What would my life had been if..." Take his second wife (some say wife, I thought it was just his live-in girlfriend). He worked with her at the post office, so he knew her before he entered Vietnam. Perhaps he had had unholy thoughts about this attractive woman when he was married to his first wife. Thus, the scenario spins out about what his life would have been like if he'd have ended up with this woman. I believe his son did die before he went into Vietnam, thus seeing him at the very end and his son walking him up into heaven when he finally accepts his own death. His divorce from his wife may have already happened before Vietnam, or may have been on the verge of happening while he was there. His dying mind wonders if she still loves him, or perhaps knows this already and therefore this is in his thoughts.
He was bayonetted by one of his own troop members who was freaking out on whatever drug the food that they were previously eating was laced with. Thus, Jacob's dying mind tries to figure this whole thing out as to why his troop members freaked out like they did, leading up to one of them stabbing him in his drug-induced rage. Jacob sees his friend's face before he falls, and sees the man's shocked look and knows that the man was not in his right mind and didn't mean what he had done. His mind spins the tale of what would happen if he survived, how would this affect him and his friends and would they be able to fight this in court to bring the culprit (the army) to justice?
Kind of like a feverish mind, he sees impossible things like demons and the "shaking headed" man. All from a mind that is slowly dying. We've all had a fever and had crazy dreams resulting from it. He even has a fever that almost kills him in these fantasies, tying in with his dying brain. Even though he keeps flashing back and forth between reality and his feverish fantasies, he deep down knows he is dying.
Then at the end he finally does die, and is then at peace with his little boy he lost before.
These are just some of the answers I've figured out from watching the movie many times.
A great story. I had a good time trying to piece it together - figuring it out.
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