Monday, January 5, 2015
Blog #1: Detour
As Theodore explained in his introduction to this film genre, fate stands as a defining element in Film Noir. Roberts nods directly to this idea when says he is the victim of fate as the movie comes to a close (and fate gets bandied about a good bit in the conversations along the way). What do you think? Is he a victim of fate or is he responsible for the events of the story he narrates? And record a few remarks about what struck you from the film.
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To stand behind the idea that Roberts is the “ victim of fate” you have to believe in fate itself. The definition of fate is: “ the development of events beyond a person's control, regarded as determined by a supernatural power.” I think that it was fate that the car came by when it did. It was fate that Haskell died when he did. But Roberts was not the victim of fate because he had the ability to choose what he did in the situations
ReplyDelete“ fate ” put him in. One could argue that his choices are fate. But that contradicts the definition of the word because it states the events of fate are out of a person’s control. Although fate may limit the amount of choices offered, Roberts decisions were not fate. Roberts chose to hide the body and drive away. He chose to take under a false identity and not come forward to the police. Therefore, Roberts is responsible for the story he narrates.
I loved how Edgar Ulmer took a simple plot and created an action filled movie that really stands out for the time. One aspect of the film that struck me was Roberts character development. The viewer watches as Roberts changes from a harmless lover into an experienced criminal. When Roberts committed his first crime he tried to justify it to himself. When he accidentally killed the women he recognized it as his fault. Which was a step in the right direction despite the fact he did not come forward.
- Maggie
I think that Al Robert's fate was completely under his control until he had to decide whether to leave the body and take the car to Los Angeles, or to wait for the police to show up and explain what happened. It was a slippery slope of fate after he decided to take the car. Once he meets Vera, he loses control and succumbs to fate. Vera's controlling nature represents how fate has taken hold of him. He acknowledges this when he says, "No matter where you turn in life, fate is always there with a foot out to trip you." Even after Vera died, his original plans were already so screwed up that he decided to give up on finding Sue and let fate continue to control him, as represented by him getting arrested at the end. In sum, I feel that he controlled his fate until he met Vera, then fate took hold and he no longer controlled his future. Also, the fact that Al thought that Sue wouldn't succeed in Los Angeles, and he himself ended up in prison while Sue ended up with a decent career, was one I found interesting.
ReplyDelete-Henry
I think the events Roberts is faced with are a result of chance--which I suppose you could call fate--but his decisions and the consequences of them are entirely his own. Therefore, Charles’ death was arguably fated, but Roberts’ actions--hiding the body and stealing his belongings--were not; they were his responses to a fated event. He had the ability to alter the conclusion when faced with the death: he could have come clean to the police, and a likely explanation for the man’s untimely death would most likely have been found (as I remember, it was that he was sick). Instead, Roberts imagined himself cornered, and allowed himself only one option. Later, seeing Vera standing on the side of the road, he offers her a ride: it was fate that she was standing there, but not that he called out to her. She wasn’t even looking his way--he called attention to himself. Now, there’s no way he could have known who she was at the time, but he did know the gravity of his situation, and should have been wiser than to invite a stranger into his precarious predicament; even had she not been Vera, she would have been a witness--someone the police could call on when the body was found and the car was not. I do not believe that Roberts is the victim of fate, but the victim of limited sight: he had the power of choice, he just refused to see the other options.
ReplyDeleteI was struck by the pervasiveness of pessimism, which I think was the root of Roberts’ limited sight: always seeing the glass half empty, he couldn’t imagine that the police wouldn’t find him guilty; ironically, his certainty that he would be found guilty is the very reason he made the choices that led him to commit murder.
I think fate is an excuse generated by those who think themselves helpless due to their own cynicism.
I agree to the idea that Roberts is a "victim of fate". Although, he wasn't being forced by the woman he loves to travel from New York to California. Roberts, himself, has chosen to trek across the country. Clearly he has no idea of what will happen when he gets into the car, and at first was just an innocent ride to see his lover. Fate, literally, takes the wheel when Roberts notices that the car owner is dead. Roberts knows that he looks very guilty and decides to hid the body out of sight and tread lightly, which is more of a choice than fate. Roberts continues to trek to Hollywood after picking up a sneaky and tricky woman who catches him red- handed, making Roberts a true "victim of fate". The woman sets him up by wrapping a phone cord around her neck, which Roberts proceeds to yank and ends up killing her. I thought that it was interesting that the beginning of the movie sets Roberts in a diner, present time. Roberts begins to narrate and there is a flashback to the beginning of the true story, in past time. Which wraps around to present time in the movie.
ReplyDeleteI think Roberts’ story begins with him as a victim of fate, because he had no direct involvement in the death of Charles Haskell Jr., or any way of preventing it from happening. However, after that point Roberts’ choices shifted responsibility for the later events onto his shoulders. Picking up Vera, knowing that he was in a stolen car with a stolen identity was a bad choice even before it was revealed that the recently deceased Charles Haskell Jr. had also picked her up. The downward spiral from there was perpetuated by his inability to cut his losses and move on until the very end of the film, where he went from unfortunate bystander to murderer. In the end he throws himself to whatever fate has in store for him. I liked how Ulmer depicted the downward spiral that Theodore described, with Roberts going from fairly in control of his own destiny to wandering without a purpose or place to call home.
ReplyDeleteSimilarly to Margaret, I was struck by Roberts’ pessimism. He seemed to lack the will to assert himself at any point in the film, whether he was half-heartedly trying to guilt Sue into staying or attempting to get away from Vera. The only exceptions to his attitude were his outburst at the man playing music in the diner, and when he grabbed Vera to prevent her from using the phone.
I think that Roberts is a victim of fate yet he is still responsible for his actions at the same time. What I mean by that is that it was no fault of his own that Haskell died, but when he decided to hide the body and everything that occurred after that is his own fault. The way that I look at this is he was dealt a hand of cards which he had no input on, but he can choose how to play the cards. For example when Haskell died he could have decided to wait for the police and there is a chance he would have been fine. He also could have not picked up any hitch hikers and go straight to Los Angles and he would have not had any problem. Because of this I think that there was a lot of bad luck involved but he enhanced the issue.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that I found very intestine about the movie is how they ended it with Roberts getting picked up by the police. I would think that if they had that happened they would clarify what happens with Roberts.
Erin Meller
ReplyDeleteI'd say that Al was definitely a victim of fate. Though he could have handled the situations he was in much better than he had, the series of circumstances that lead to each situation was out of his control. He was frightened, and perhaps not remarkably cunning, but his fumbles and choices were simply the acts of someone who did not know what else to do. Charles dies next to him, but while his actions after said death were crucial to which path of fate he went down, it was not under his control just who in just which car came by as he hitchhiked, and certainly he was not responsible for Charles' untimely demise.
His meeting with Vera was also by chance - he offers a ride to someone who just so happens to know the man he'd ridden with only hours before, not to mention how irritable and ambitious she turned out to be. His attempt to break the phone accidentally choked her to death, therefore turning him into the murderer she believed him to be. By the end, the police were searching for a dead man who was suspected to have murdered his "wife," leaving Roberts with an overall traumatic, if not legally damaging, experience. An experience which, although he accidentally contributed to, he was not responsible for.
He put the puzzle together, but the pieces were not his making.
I honestly want to know what killed Charles - was it the substance in the box he repeatedly requested? And why did Vera so persistently try to convince Roberts that he murdered Charles, and that he would work with her to gain a fortune? Was she reflecting herself onto him, believing him to conform to her morals?
I believe it was both fate and Robert's choice that played a role in the outcome of the film. It was pure fate that brought Charles Haskell's car to him, but his choice to ride in the car with him. Throughout their car journey, Haskell gradually takes pills of some sort, which (I assume) is the leading cause of his death. Nevertheless, Robert has no control over the situation. It was not his choice upon the death of Charles Haskell, but fate itself. Due to this, Robert, however, is given a choice of what he should do with Haskell’s body. The specific choice he makes of dragging the body into a lake is the main component to the rest of his misfortunes in the film. At this point in the film he decides to carry on with the situation and steal Haskell’s identity to avoid the consequences. Throughout the entire middle-portion of the film, it’s all Robert’s choices that cause is trouble. However, towards the end of the movie, he gets in an argument with Vera about whether or not she will turn him into the police. She wraps the telephone chord around her neck and by fate, he pulls on the chord thinking he is just going to break the line, but ends up killing her. The end of the film and the death of Vera is derived all from the choices he had maid previously. Therefore, I do believe in the idea that he is a “victim of fate” BUT also that he is completely responsible for the events. Perhaps, its fate that lead him up to making the choices he did. Overall, I quite enjoyed the film. It was a very basic plot, but it was created into a much more interesting film to watch.
ReplyDeleteI believe that fate absolutely played a big role in this film we watched today. This was made obvious by the fact that Robert had no intention to kill anyone, yet without his intention he was in a way responsible for the deaths of two people. Fate is a player in this because it was almost his destiny. The fact that he did not actually try to kill these people and still witnessed their deaths made me believe that he had no choice in his outcome, and that it was all decided by fate. On the other hand, he did play a small role in the death of Vera, and it was his hand that struck her, his decision to harm her and eventually kill her. I do not think fate played as big a role in her death than that of Haskell's. One of my favorite scenes in the movie is when Robert is trying to sell the used car and is almost caught up in the life insurance issue when Vera runs in and tells the dealer that they are not looking to sell. I believe that fate also plays a role in this scenario because Vera read the newspaper at the same time that Robert was going to be caught, a large coincidence.
ReplyDeleteThrough his own shortsightedness and selfishness, Roberts is mostly responsible for the events that lead to his arrest. When he finds Haskell dead, he panics and assumes that the police would think he was guilty of murder and most juries would convict him. However, if he had reported the crime immediately, the police wouldn't have found a motive. Instead, he provides them with a motive and actually breaks the law by stealing Haskell's car, money, and identity in an act of pure self-preservation. He doesn't consider Haskell's family, who would want to know what had happened to him. His fleeing, stealing, and hiding the body, which make him look completely guilty, later allow Vera to try to blackmail him into her nefarious schemes, including continuing to impersonate Haskell Jr. to take some of Haskell Sr.'s inheritance. The argument about this plan, which would have ended immediately if Vera had no leverage, leads to Vera getting angry, drunk, starting to call the police, and dying. Although Roberts can't entirely be blamed for her death (fate and chance did contribute), he had done enough wrong by that point to justify his arrest, but not a full murder sentence.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that struck me about the film was the utter rudeness, selfishness, and one-sided nature of Vera's character. I had thought that the femme fatal would be a little morally ambiguous or at least seem kind at first sight. The dramatic dark, monochromatic color scheme, although not a surprise, stood out because I haven't had much experience with it.
I think that the Robert is a victim of fate and choice. In the movie he keeps on talking about how his life would be different if that one car didn't pull up to the side of the road. Throughout the movie the events that happen are not all his fault. He did not have to take the car that pulled up, but why would he not take the car? Fate brought him the car and he had the choice to take it. He also didn't ask for the guy to die in the car and he had not many choices to do anything. He also had the choice of not pulling the phone cord, but fate brought that lady into his life so didn't have much of a choice. Fate and choice were both in act in this movie. One was much as important as the other. Fate can be an awful thing, but the choices people make can change their fate.
ReplyDeleteI think Roberts choices were integral to his problems but fate also played a part in it too. It was fate that brought upon Haskell's death but it's Robert's choice to hide the body and assume Haskell's identity that prevents him from avoiding any of the situations that he ends up facing. Meeting Vera was an unfortunate occurrence and the fact the is greedy makes it even worse. Due to Robert's actions it looks like he killed Haskell and Vera holds this over him. He's gone to far to be believed if Vera went to the police. Vera's death by telephone cord was severely unfortunate and not his fault but he can not plausibly explain his innocence without talking about Haskell so he is forced to run. He made a bad choice and fate makes him pay for it.
ReplyDeleteI don't think we can label Roberts as a victim to fate or responsible for his actions. Rather he is a combination of both. How was he to know that Haskell was going to die as Roberts was driving him? But should he have abandoned the body on the side of the road and drove away with the stolen car of a dead man. Probably, not the best idea. He comes across a frightening situation, that hand is dealt by fate. How he deals with the situation is up to him entirely. Had he stayed with the body and alerted the police, he would probably end up with a much happier ending. But he left the body, committed grand theft auto, and then later committed manslaughter and now finds himself with a ton of blood on his hands.
ReplyDelete