"Why don't you pass the time by playing a little solitaire? "

I remember the first time I ever watched this film. Our local library holds movie nights over the summer every Tuesday and I would try to attend every single one. After the showing of this, I remember walking out that night thinking how much better older films are than anything now adays. This is a film that everyone who claims they are a movie lover should see. ( It also lets everyone see Frankie in a different kind of film : ) )

This film plays with so many different themes and ideas that it is hard to focus on all the different things that are happening at once. One of my favorite scenes from this film, is when the American soliders are haullecinating that the Communists who are brain washing them are middle old aged women. This scene at first confused me. I wasn't sure exactly what was happening, and which scene was real. I think this was the point of the scene at the beginning. I think that the audience wasn't supposed to understand which scene to believe, whether it was the old women or the Communists speaking to the American soliders, just as they aren't sure either. It shortly becomes clear what it was intended to be a little later in the film, but I thought it was creative how that scene was shot.

What I found to be really creepy was the mother. Angela Lansbury did a brillant job being a sick and incestious mother. An Odepius conflict can be identified between the mother and her son. It becomes evident that her mother cares so much for her son that she doesn't want him to be with anyone else. When her son falls in love for the first time, his mother tries to destroy their relationship by telling him that his son's lovers father is a Communist. Even later on in the film when he marries his long lost love, his mother "programs" him to kill her. In the article it states that " Her incestious love for him,which repels Harvey but which he cannot ecsape." This helps to show how she has subconciously gained control over her own son. Creepy.

I think the ending of this film shocks me every time I watch it. It makes me feel good inside though to know that the main character finally realized he was brainwashed and the only way to save himself was to end the source of the problem. Even though he had to kill himself to release the hold that others had upon him, he ended up killing his mother in the process.

This film could be a great one to teach in classes while learning about Communism and how it impacted the United States, and I think I may use this when I teach my own class in the future.