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Ethan Frome
Starring Liam Neeson
Based on the novel by Edith Wharton. Ethan is a sturdy, promising young New
Englander, whose ambitions are thwarted by his mother's sickness and
death. After his mother dies, he marries a distant cousin who has been
tending to his mother's needs. She then becomes sickly herself and calls
on another distant cousin to come and care for her. The second woman
herself seems sickly at first, but eventually recovers and becomes
strong and vivacious, enough to seduce Ethan while his wife is
visiting a doctor in a distant town. Whether or not the wife knows
of this, she sends the caretaker away on the basis of
petty criticisms, intending to hire another caretaker. Ethan, very
much in love, takes her to the train, trying to persuade her to
leave with him for Florida, which stands for heaven in the
movie's symbolism. In the course of the afternoon, Ethan asks her to
tell him her heart's desire: it is to go sledriding
down the tall mountain near the town. Ethan procures a sled, and they have
a good time together until a terrible accident leaves Ethan with
a lame leg and the girl-- well, sickly. We see the old Ethan, now
a recluse, doing manual labor to support the two sickly women who now live with him at home.
It's all told very deadpan, but the ironies are great: a man frustrated by three sickly women. God conspires against him, or so it seems.