Reaction to "Ethan Frome"
The movie begins in winter and Reverend Smith enters the town to serve the community of Starkfield. Eager to do god's work, this very ambitious preacher pities an old man and wishes to help him. The people of the town seem to become rigged and tightlipped whenever Reverend Smith ever brings him up. Mr. Smith's keeper Mrs. Crane explains to him that he has sinned and begins to tell him the story of Ethan Frome's misfortune. It's at this point in the movie when there is a flashback sequence that lasts for most of the remainder of the film. We find out that the old cripple was not always crippled. It seems curious to how he got this way. We also meet a new character, which is a distant cousin of Ethan's. Zeena was sent to live with Ethan to help take care of his mother until the day of her death during the winter. Too cold to travel home, Zeena stays with Ethan. They eventually fall in love and get married. As time progresses, Zeena's health declines and she sends for a relative to come live with them until her health improves. Mattie Silver arrives to take care of her cousin and eventually caches the eye of Ethan. A strong sexual tensio
It is at this point in the movie when we come back to the present and discover a very strange twist. Both Ethan and Mattie are left alive and permanently disabled living to gather with the then well Mrs. I related to Reverend Smith in that I was curious to the story that was Ethan Frome's. To do this film and Edith Wharton's novel justice, I feel I must respond in an honest and objective manor. Being that I have never read the actual novel, I felt that there was at times too much drama and overacting to consider the story realistic or naturalistic. As I watched the film, I placed myself the shoes of Smith trying to understand what sin Ethan had committed and curious to find out what happened to his leg and why we were spared to see what was in the bedroom of the old man's cabin. With respect to the story itself, winter seemed to play a larger role when compared to other so-called realistic or naturalistic writings of Wharton's time period. As Ethan is taking Mattie to the train station to leave the town, they decide to go sledding where on top of a hill they express their passion for each other. The man's libido is a very powerful force and when that man and two relatively young women are cooped together in a cabin for long periods of time with no or little entertainment during cold winters, one could only imagine the scandalous out comings of the situation. This interpretation of the film may seem dry, but I found the psychological impacts of the characters to be very interesting, more so than the actual story with the exception of the twist ending. Most of the screenplay was somewhat unrealistic to me. n builds between the two and they eventually fall for one another.
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Acceptance Essays
