I must have watched this film a good eight or nine times before I decided to write down my thoughts, for no other reason than the fact that I still haven’t gotten over it, even after watching it so many times.
God, I still haven't gotten over it. I have no idea where to start to express how deeply personal and important this film has become to me since I first saw it. It really is everything that I could have hoped for and then some.
I mean, I certainly came into the film with high expectations. As a raging bisexual, this film has been on my “Must Watch” list since I was old enough to know what “film” was. But I am often disappointed with films that I have high expectations for (see Death on the Nile) and I didn't want Carol to do that. It didn't. God, it really didn't.
The film is a love story, set in the 1950s in America, between two unlikely people: an aspiring young photographer, and a recently divorced unenthusiastic socialite. Even as I'm writing this I can't begin to fathom how such a perfect film came into being. Where to start? How to start? How does one put into words the extent to which this film has astonished me, moved me, touched me?
How can I possibly convey the way this film has returned me to a child who had only seen a few films and still gasped in delight whenever a film transported me to a different world? How can I possible explain how this film has, through its unique magic, made me believe again, the way that I hadn't since I was thirteen, that love can truly exist despite barriers and boundaries?
I'll try. But I hope that whether or not this review makes sense to you that people will watch this film. Whether or not this review is good, this film deserves everything in the world, and I wish it were possible for me to convey how much I love this film.
I think I’ll start with the themes of the movie. The film tackles many themes, among the most prominent of which are love, friendship, marriage, and family. The LGBTQ themes of the film are much discussed, but the theme that I think warrants more analysis is the recurring theme of family and friendship. Whether that is Therese’s friendship with Danny or Carol’s friendship with Abby and Jeanette, being able to see these characters have their own support system is touching, to say the least. And the family. The themes of family are best demonstrated in Carol’s love for her daughter, Rindy. It isn’t hard for the audience to see how much she loves her daughter: she spends time with her, makes sure she knows that she is not to blame for her parents’ divorce, and fights for her custody rights tooth and nail along the way. But in the end, the mother who would have sacrificed her own personal life, who would have gave up her life to keep her daughter by her side, gave up the custody battle.
It could be interpreted, Carol’s move here, as her not loving her daughter. But I disagree. I think it is because Carol loved her daughter so much that she didn’t continue to fight for custody. There are three reasons for this: number one, Harge, Carol’s ex-husband, is not the kind to let this go without a fight, a fight that would most likely result in audio tapes of Carol’s sexual encounter being released to the courts, and as a result, the public. Even if Carol’s sexual partner were not a woman, this would be something Carol wouldn’t be able to shake for a long time, and though she may not have cared for her own social suffering, her daughter would most likely have been harmed by this. Kids can be cruel, and if they found out her mother’s sex tape was released to the public… Rindy would be mercilessly bullied. And Carol is bisexual at the very least. In America in the 1950s. Once again, like her sex tapes being released, the impact of people talking and gossiping would harm not only her, but also Rindy, and though Carol may not see anything wrong with loving who she loves, she is intelligent enough to know that the majority of society doesn’t agree with her, and that her daughter would be hurt in the crossfire.
Secondly, Harge is not willing to back down. How could a man who would go to such great, even illegal lengths, to record her sexual endeavours be willing to back down now? But the custody battle that would ensue would harm Rindy the most. Caught between her parents, it wouldn’t be a far stretch for Rindy to think that she caused her parents to hate each other, and drown herself in her guilt. Carol, who would whisper to her daughter that it has nothing to do with her that mommy and daddy are separating, would never be able to stand by and allow that to happen to her daughter.
And finally, like Carol herself says, what use is she to her daughter if she can’t set an example for her? If Carol lives against her heart’s wishes for the rest of her life, hiding who she is under a manufactured veneer, what example is she setting for Rindy? What is she implying to Rindy?
Better to have Rindy be with her father, wealthy and influential, who certainly loves her, who would be a better alternative than what Carol could offer. And so Carol backs down, though it is obvious it breaks her heart into a million pieces to do so.
I think the scene in the lawyer's office, the line when Carol says, "What happened with Therese, I wanted. And I will not deny it." This is what pride is when we speak about LGBTQ+ pride. Pride is refusing a life in which you have to hide who you love and the relationship you are proud of. Pride is refusing to admit defeat to a world that has deemed you "immoral" for loving the person you do, and refusing to lie about that. Even in small moments like the way she doesn't let Abby blame herself for the injunction, doesn't want Abby to leave after a car turns up in her drive that is very possibly her husband, when she tells Therese it is not her fault, Carol is proud.
Carol is proud, but even the proudest of us can't always fight an uphill battle constantly, and so, like those of us who have been repressed for too long, she tries to give up, to succumb to the overwhelming pressure of what the world wants. When she relents, it is not only her own coloring that has lost it vivaciousness. To the audience, it is even more heartbreaking, because she is proud, and to see a proud head bent is perhaps one of the most devastating things.
But in that lawyer's office, she remembers her pride, and remembers her love. She remembers that no matter what the world sees her as, she is herself, and to love who she loves is the way she can continue to be herself. And with this simple statement of pride, she signs her daughter away herself.
I can't begin to express the pain I feel for Carol, being forced to choose between what is essentially who she is and her child. The anger I feel at the world that is so cruel as to keep a daughter away from her mother, because her mother has chosen to love an unconventional partner. And I can't begin to express the regret I feel when I think about the world after the snapshot of their lives this film documents. Would Carol have lived to see gay marriage legalized in America? Would Carol and Therese have stayed together long enough to be able to go out and march during June Pride, and proudly been able to hold hands in public?
But of course, besides familial love, there is also the love between Carol and Therese, such a beautiful love that one could not help but question all those who ever declared homosexual love to be against nature.
How could nature be against something so beautiful, something so giving, so complete?
I read somewhere a line that I think will stay with me for a long time about the love between Carol and Therese, and it goes something like this:
They love each other deeply, differently, because they are victims to different burdens. Carol's love is like a rich coffee: it's bitter, but it's also sweet. It is warm, it is strong, and it stays with you for a long time. It surrounds you not just through taste, but also through smell, and it clings to your clothes and your hair, not intrusive but a comforting presence. Therese's love is like the stars in the night: though it is dim in comparison to the sun or the moon, it is always there, a constant after millennium. Times change, things change, but it is still there, hanging high up in the sky, a quiet companion.
Therese’s love is more subtle, shown in her choices: she doesn’t go on a trip she had been planning for a long time to the most romantic city in the world with Richard, but she is willing to go on a road trip to the middle of nowhere with Carol in a heartbeat. She doesn’t take portraits, but when she starts to, she chooses Carol to be her muse. She loves her camera with her life, and her camera roll is full of Carol, pictures of Carol sleeping, of Carol laughing, of Carol staring into space. She crumples up the note Carol sends her, yet still she remembers, even only after reading once or twice, the place and time Carol asked to meet her. It would have been so easy to leave Carol hanging, to not put herself and her love on the line again by meeting someone who has left her once already. But she goes, and though she is stiff and uncomfortable, she goes, and she stays. Even in her anger and hurt she doesn't let Carol diminish her importance in Therese's life, responding with a firm "No" when Carol, half-jokingly, half-fearfully, asks if Therese's growth is because Carol left her.
Carol’s love is more outspoken: she is willing to stand against a society filled with prejudice and homophobia, and state with no uncertainty that the heart wants what it wants, and what she wants is Therese. She is collected and poised, yet she is comfortable enough to break down in front of Therese. She is elegant and eloquent, yet she can be silly with Therese. She is strong and proud, yet the only time during the entire movie she is truly vulnerable is when she lays all of herself down with a simple “I love you” in front of Therese. She never loses control. Even with Rindy and the injunction she knew she could chose to live a life of lies and not lose her daughter, and so in some way she still has control. But when she throws in her Hail Mary in the face of Therese's unrelenting hurt, her eyes red-rimmed and her voice trembling, that is the only time in the entire film where she lets go of control, and let's herself just be. An "I love you" is always something out of our control, because rejection can come as simple as a laugh or a toss of hair, yet Carol relinquishes that control, and lets herself take the risk that is love.
"I love you." Three small words. Three small words that have altered histories, societies, cultures. In Awakening, a book on how members of the LGBTQ+ community brought marriage equality to America, author Nathaniel Frank writes, "Above all, the battle for marriage equality is a love story. Because no matter how political the battle for marriage became, no matter how pragmatic the focus on benefits and legal protections, no matter how dogmatic the arguments against including gays and lesbians in this central American institution, this was a quest by LGBTQ people to take themselves and their love seriously, and to have both recognized-- unalterable, simply-- as equal."
How can a love so deep, so life altering, so magnificent, be wrong?
And now, of course, I have to talk about the actors, because I would be remiss if I didn’t mention how much this film is like a masterclass in acting. Each scene with Rooney Mara and Cate Blanchett I had to watch at least four times: the first time to see the plot; the second, to focus on their facial expressions; the third, to focus on their eyes; the fourth, to focus on the details of their portrayal. Mara’s performance, at first glance, is not nearly as compelling as Blanchett’s, until you watch each scene the way I do. The way that she conveys Therese’s feelings is not just through expressions, but also through her breathing, the pace of her breathing. The scene in the end, when Carol is trying to reconcile with Therese, the two are interrupted and Carol moves to leave. Before leaving, she rests her hand on Therese’s shoulder, and squeezes. A small choice that Mara makes makes this scene even more impactful: she closes her eyes. The moment I saw Therese’s eyes close, I knew that she would go back to Carol, because with this simple expression, I saw Therese’s still lingering love for Carol, I saw Therese’s flashback to all of the times she had with Carol, I saw Therese’s yearning for Carol.
Cate Blanchett, of course, was impeccable. She is truly the master of expression. The scene when she gives up the fight for Rindy’s custody, when she stumbles over the world “cope” and her breath catching on the words “ugly people," conveys the extent of the heartbreak of Carol in this scene. Carol is collected and is obviously trying to control her tears, and she says nothing of her pain in this scene. But with these small breaks in her voice during Carol’s monologue, Blanchett conveys the depth of Carol’s pain. And when Carol is meeting Therese to try to reconcile with her and they are interrupted by Jack, the amount of emotion expressed in Blanchett's eyes are overwhelming. They are filled with regret, they are lingering, they are sad, loving… They are a million words, and Blanchett conveys this with nothing more than a glance. Carol was given life when Cate Blanchett stepped into those famous fur coats, and she is the masterpiece she is because Cate Blanchett breathed life into her.
This is a movie for everyone, whether or not you support gay relationships, because it really is not pushing an agenda. The film is nothing more than a love story, a love story where the people in love just so happen to be both women. The film doesn’t explicitly point out any of the unfairness they are subjected to, and instead just tells a story of lovers forbidden to love. It is truly beautiful in that it doesn’t seem to always know it is a lesbian film, and instead just sees itself as a romantic film. It doesn't push forward any message; instead, it allows the message to show for itself through the lingering and wanting glances between two so deeply in love yet separated by so many obstacles.
And finally, one of my favorite quotes from the movie:
“My angel. Flung out of space.”
Happy Saturday!!
(John Mulaney is hosting SNL and I’m crossing my fingers for a Bill Hader cameo!!!!)
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