The Worst Person In The World

Mark feels like Bambi on the ice as he tries to figure out what makes The Worst Person In The World feel so representative for a generation, whether Julie really changes or not, and if you can truly love someone who thinks they created an "iconic butthole".

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Transcript

Hi everybody, and welcome to Mark Overanalyses Film! Today, I will be discussing 2021’s The Worst Person In The World. Before I begin, a brief reminder that I am available for story coaching and reading at Markoveranalysesstory.com. Also, there’s going to be a lot of butchered pronunciation of Norwegian names here, so I apologise in advance.

The Worst Person In The World was directed by Joachim von Trier, who co-wrote the script with Eskil Vogt. I think it’s probably valuable to note as well that the whole story was based on a conversation that von Trier had with the lead actress Renate Reinsve years earlier, and she was apparently consulted throughout. It seems like such a nice story, as Reinsve has stated that before von Trier approached her about this film, she was about to give up acting altogether and focus on carpentry. Just like Harrison Ford. That’s Film 2, Carpentry 0. I guess you can go ahead and suck it, carpentry.

Now, I found The Worst Person In The World a little challenging to overanalyse. On the one hand, those who like it, adore it. The protagonist Julia is a special character who really seems to represent a lot of struggles for a lot of people, and her problems and concerns feel… near generational. On the other hand, critics of the film say that Reinsve’s performance in this role covers a lack of depth in the character and story, and that there’s no real character arc. So, do the critics have a point, and The Worst Person In The World is merely a much, much, much better version of the kind of story I used to write in college? Or are said critics missing the essential nature of who Julia is and what this story is really about?

With all that in mind, first, I’ll look at the fundamental features of the protagonist, and then I’ll go through the main story beats by looking at the sequences of the film. Then, I’ll talk about the main things I learned along the way.

Ok, so, without further ado, let’s get into the 5 Questions about the protagonist. 

Q1: Whose story is it? 

This is the story of Julia, a Norwegian woman whom we follow from her early 20s to early 30s. If you asked Julia one day, she might describe herself as impetuous and courageous. The next day, she might say flaky and cowardly. But one way or another, time keeps ticking by, and there are questions about what she wants to do and who she wants to be that just will not go away.  

Q2: What is her life dream?
Life dream here refers to what it is that the protagonist wants or is aiming to do when the film begins and the story has yet to properly start. When we meet Julia first, really she’s looking for a calling. She starts out studying medicine, then moves into Psychology, then moves into Photography. Now later, there’s reason to believe that both of these switches were justified. But possibly as a coincidence, and possibly not, there’s always a man involved in these changes, and there’s a sense she leaves all of this behind for another man: Aksel. 

Q3: What is her want?

Want here is what the character is trying to achieve in Act II of the film, from the moment they really begin their journey until the moment they are at their most defeated. As such, it is a SMART goal, in that it is Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and normally — but not much so in this case — Time bound. Now, The Worst Person In The World feels kind of episodic and hard to pin down, doesn’t it? Still, there’s a few things we can consider. At minute 22, Julia contemplates Aksel as he plays with some young kids, and the question is raised: “Will Julia have a child?” At minute 93, Julia discovers that she is pregnant. Despite the somewhat episodic nature of the journey, the tangible question of pregnancy undeniably gives the story an overall shape. But, you might point out, is this really what Julia wants or what she is trying to achieve throughout Act II? It’s not exactly 71 minutes of her trying to get or not get pregnant. But she does tell Aksel during their argument that she does want kids… eventually. She’s just not sure what has to “happen first”. There’s a sense that she feels that she needs to grow up a bit, or at least feel more grounded, less unsure. But, also, this is a film clearly about modern relationships, and Julia is always in a relationship. So, let me say imperfectly then that: Julia wants to feel truly settled, to find her place in the world, within a relationship before she gets pregnant.  

Q4: What is her need?

Need is the human quality or piece of wisdom that the character lacks at the beginning of the story. Once again, this question of character arc comes up, but Julia is certainly different at the end then she is at the beginning. And as we’ll see, this is clearly charted in the key moments of the story, just as you’d expect. 

So, what is her Need? Well, there’s probably a few ways to think about it, but I’m inclined to think that Julia needs to really think about herself on her own terms. She needs to stand on her own two feet. Or perhaps you could say she needs the confidence to give herself the time to do so. On this note, another criticism that came up of the film was that Julia is too defined by her relationships. Now, maybe that’s true, but personally I’m inclined to think that’s the whole point, as I’ll talk about later.

Q5: Does she get what she wants and/or what she needs?
So, Julia never gets that settled in a relationship feeling that she seems to be seeking, but she does get what she needs: a life and a real career on her own terms.

Ok, now that I’ve attempted to answer the 5 key questions, let’s have a look at The Worst Person In The World’s sequences. 

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The Sequences

There are normally, but not always, 8 sequences, or stages, in a film. A sequence is a combination of scenes that are tied together by having a single overriding dramatic question or tension, and they tend to be between 10 and 15 minutes in length. A good way to think about it is that every 10-15 minutes, the audience should be on some level asking themselves a different dramatic question. Now, it must be pointed out here that The Worst Person In The World divides itself into chapters: 14 in total, 12 plus a prologue and epilogue. But I would still say that these still basically break into 8 pretty clean stages, so that’s the main framework I’ll be using. 

So we start with Sequence I, life as it is. Or, as this film calls it: the prologue. Julia, we are told immediately, was disappointed with herself. We discover that Julia is experiencing what so many young people do. School is like a train track, and then you get off the train, off the fixed track, and you’re told to figure your own way forward. As soon as the fixed track gets taken away, Julia begins to struggle with, really, a combination of her privileged position and her own talent. I’ll talk more about this later, but her problem is really that she could do almost anything. So, she ends up trying a variety of things. And nothing seems to stick. But she does enjoy photography, which opens up a whole new world to her. And that includes, setting her up for her inciting incident, the event without which our story as it is would not happen. So, at minute 6, Julia meets Aksel: an older comic book artist. And he stresses the word ‘artist’. Julia moves in with him and all seems well, so it’s time we get this story going. Julia’s way of coping is about to be disrupted, and so at minute 9, we enter sequence II.

Sequence II, or chapter 1 here, is intriguingly titled “The Others”. And really it’s about the external pressures on her relationship with Aksel. They spend a weekend with his friends, or possibly family (?), I’m not sure. They’re older, and she feels out of place. And then one of their kids has a bit of a meltdown, and it draws out the tension between her and Aksel about her not being ready to have kids. And I feel so sorry for Julia here cos whether Aksel is just a different type of person, or is just older and has forgotten what it’s like to be her age, he cannot see her point. She doesn’t have a list of boxes that need to be ticked and then: ready for babies. She just knows what she feels: that she’s not ready now. Now, it’s also worth pointing out here that the following night, things get a little younger in spirit, and more Julia’s speed. There’s music and dancing. She insists the mom from the previous episode comes out dancing, and said mom hits her head off a lightbulb. It’s not really Julia’s fault, but she feels responsible. And basically she feels guilty about being younger and seemingly immature. Accidents don’t happen so much when you’re sitting around a table, drinking wine talking about how young people these days think they know everything. So, Julia feels guilty. And then, the couple who have a massive blow out from this accident make up the following day, which seems to support Aksel’s point that people figure things out as they go. And right after seeing this, Julia turns to see Aksel playing with the kids. So, Julia feels guilty for not being more of a grown up, and Aksel seems to have a point. So, we have our big question: “Will Julia have kids?” And so, at minute 20, we end Act I, and we enter Act II.

Act II begins with sequence III, the first attempts to solve the problem. It’s also characterised by what we can term “The Refusal of Call”. The hero is called to their need and they initially refuse. And so, this is Chapter 2 here, titled “Cheating”. And so, our sequence tension is unsurprisingly something along the lines of “Will Julia cheat on Aksel?” Now, right at the bridge between Act I and Act II, we tend to have what we can call a “What’s the plan?” scene, wherein we see what our long Act II is going to look like. And so, we begin by seeing Julia lonely and directionless, and distracting herself with the novelty of other people. We cut back to the opening shot of the film, which shows Julia alone, and clearly lonely. She is once again out of place in a world that is entirely Aksel’s. Where are her friends at this thing? Does she even have any, or has she let herself and her world be defined by her relationship with Aksel? So there’s a problem. She leaves the party, and in a foreshadowing of the climax, as she must be considering an end to her life as she knows it with Aksel, she watches the sky after sunset. But this is the refusal of the call, so rather than embrace the pain and uncertainty of loneliness, Julia crashes a party and spends the evening not cheating with extreme prejudice with big strapping lug Eivind. And, it’s worth noting that they first bond over Julia’s giving one of those “Women who talk about nothing but their own motherhood” some serious trolling. I’ll get back to this later, but Eivind represents the opposite of Aksel. Aksel wants Julia to “grow up” and become a mother already, Eivind doesn’t want kids, wears hoodies, and works in a cafe. Something I relate to very much, but many would consider a Peter Pan refusing to grow up. Now, I love this sequence. It’s fantastic. The film doesn’t just show a meet cute and cut to the typical “couple in middle distance laughing while music plays” montage. It spends time with these two and shows who they are with each other. And there’s one key point here. When they both reveal secrets to each other, Julia tells Eivind a deeply private sexual driver, and Eivind realises that he’s misunderstood and has a much less insightful disclosure that he likes Oslo’s city centre architecture. Their connection is shown, they’re both fun and playful. But also this eventual schism is foreshadowed too, that Julia has deeper, or at least more personally focused, interests and questions. But, this night of fun eventually comes to an end, and at minute 36, Julia finally accepts the call. Or, you could say she makes her first UNconscious move towards her need. She does not kiss Eivind, and refuses to learn his name for fear that she would impulsively look him up. We’ve answered our sequence tension (Julia did not cheat), so it’s time for sequence IV: the greater attempts to solve the problem. 

Now, this is where things get a little messier, partially because the chapters start varying in length much more and don’t correspond directly to traditional story stages. So, let me call this a section rather than a sequence, cos it’s made up of chapters 3, 4, 5. And within that I would group 3 and 4 together as one, and 5 as its own thing. Overall though, there’s a clear “shit or get off the pot” element here, as we wonder “Will Julia find a way to express herself truly in her relationship with Aksel?”. Ok, on with the story. And right off the bat, you could easily convince me that what happens next is really Julia’s first unconscious move towards her need. At home, she wants to tell Aksel something, perhaps about her night with Eivind, but Aksel is too occupied. Removed from her relationship with a man, she begins to express herself on her own terms, and writes the article “Oral Sex in the age of #MeToo”, which certainly exploring ideas of her own relationship with men. She shows it to Aksel, and it becomes a bit of a thing online. Which is great, and surely a sign that Julia has both talent and something to say... But then time keeps passing. We soon see Julia turn 30, which is again riddled with the shadows cast over her freer spirit. Her father has not turned up at the small get together, and once again there are no actual friends here. And further, she can’t help but consider how all of her female ancestors had had children by the time they were her age. A visit to her tragicomically self-involved father reveals he hasn’t even considered reading her article and then ends with Aksel telling her that she has to make her own family. So, yes it’s nice that she wrote an article, but there’s more pressure than ever on Julia now to just do the adult thing, push that existential dread right down, and just have a child already. 

At that, we begin Chapter 5, and our tension really crystalises: “Will Julia dump Aksel for Eivind?” So, we have back to back scenes here with Eivind re-entering our story, and Julia clearly feeling distant from Aksel. Eivind wanders around her bookshop, with his current partner, and sneaks back in to tell her where he works. It’s fun and brightly lit and full of life and play. Then, cut to a dimly lit kitchen at night, and Julia is practically shrouded in darkness, physically and psychologically distanced from Aksel and, again, his friends. Now, I know Eivind isn’t enough for Julia in the end, but I am so on Team Eivind. Aksel might be the one who Julia could have ended up with, but anyone who even gets involved in a conversation about creating an iconic butthole has real potential to be an iconic butthole.

Now, right around here, there is just so much to say. We are approaching The Worst Person In The World’s midpoint, but also its most iconic moment: Julia freezing time. It’s the kind of thing that will be used in montages of great films for decades. I have to note that it is also highly reminiscent of a film that I also completely adore: Miranda July’s The Future, which also has a character freeze time right before a break up. So, Julia considers whether or not to break up with Aksel, and then right before she does so, she flicks a switch, and freezes time. She runs carefree through the streets and finds Eivind, and the two share a wondrous, loved up day together. Now, many people have pointed out that this is a great expression of the duality of the fear and pain of ending one relationship whilst simultaneously starting a new, exciting one. But we are really close to our midpoint here, or the protagonist’s first conscious move towards her Need, and I can’t help but look at Julia’s joyous face in these moments and think about how she is emancipating herself from the pressures of the ticking clock. She is literally making time for herself. One more note on this: at the midpoint there is usually a clear foreshadowing of the climactic action. And that’s certainly the case with Julia breaking up with Aksel, but also — note that the end of her day with Eivind, and the end of her time with Aksel, is signalled by: a sunrise. 33 minutes ago, she considered a sky at dusk as she thought about her troubles with Aksel. Here, it signals her to return and break up with Aksel, and later, well… we’ll get to that.

Now, we know Julia is going to dump Aksel, so we move into what I would consider sequence VI, the 5th stage of our story: the Honeymoon sequence. It’s not the most typical of honeymoon sequences, in that it is defined by hard scenes and emotional tumult, but it is Julia doing what Julia needs to do. So, she returns to Aksel, and at minute 58 into a 121 minute runtime, almost exactly halfway in our story, Julia breaks up with Aksel: the definitive first conscious move towards her Need. But we still have a tension here which is “Will Julia actually leave?” And what follows is a heart wrenching depiction of a break up between 2 people who still love each other, but who are just not meant to be with each other. At least, not right now. And it does a great job of showing that. Eivind has his flaws, but he gives Julia more space in the relationship. Aksel starts telling her what she’s doing and why she’s doing it. As she says herself, sometimes she just wants to feel things. You could say that she needs to be herself on her own terms. But, the next thing she says is equally telling. She is terrified of being alone: that when she left him, she’d feel like Bambi on the ice. She says she knows that that’s exactly why she has to do it. But: this is our midpoint, not our climax. So when Julia walks out that door, she is not planning on being alone. She’s walking straight into another relationship with Eivind. And so, we have another brief chapter, chapter 6, where we see Eivind struggling in his relationship. Now, this chapter is important for a few reasons. First of all, it is as I’ll discuss more later, perhaps the clearest expression of someone being hemmed in and arguably changing who they are in a relationship. Second, it says the title of our film, which is always nice. And finally, it has one of my favourite dissolves that I can think of. At exactly 71 minutes 17 seconds, Eivind is framed by a small window, solemnly contemplating. But it is also dissolving from the previous scene, where he is watching Julia dancing wildly. So visually, this box with Eivind inside it is itself in Julia’s head. Is he in her head, as she is in his? It’s a great example of what a dissolve can do when used appropriately. 

At that, at minute 71, we begin chapter 7, appropriately titled “A New Chapter”, and the lovers are finally together. Now, I would argue that the moment these two get together, we’ve — ironically — finished our honeymoon period, and we’re now broadly speaking in our 6th main stage of our story: the bridge from the honeymoon to the lowpoint. First of all, because we have a new tension, which is something like “Will Julia fall in love with Eivind?”, but also because the moment she starts dating Eivind, Julia is not engaging in her Need. We see them having passionate sex once, and then she seems to move in immediately. What happened to Bambi on ice, Julia?! But there’s no denying that Eivind has real charm. He doesn’t want kids, so there’s no pressure there, and he takes Julia as she is. In some ways, perhaps even too much so. In Chapter 8, Julia’s narcissistic circus, we see Julia with her new boyfriend’s friend circle, and it is undeniably more her speed. They take some mushrooms at Julia’s behest. In the bad trip that follows, amongst other things, Julia seems to confront a lot of inner demons: her exes, her distant father, and perhaps most curiously, Aksel, his Bobcat creation, and motherhood. Now, this is The Worst Person In The World at its most free-wheeling, so I find it hard to overanalyse here with too much confidence. But, Bobcat’s whole thing is that he is a wild animal. And earlier, Aksel has lamented the removal of his iconic butthole as a kind of anaesthetising, bourgeois measure. So, it seems relevant here that as Julia suddenly has a child to nurse, Bobcat has his iconic butthole pulled off. But when the baby laughs at this, Bobcat becomes irate, eats the baby, and burps. I would be inclined to think that Julia, as someone who felt defined by Aksel, associates herself with Bobcat here, and fears that her own wildness cannot be anaesthetised by motherhood, and that her wildness could hurt her child. But I may be wildly overreaching, and that interpretation could be entirely wrong. At any rate, the following morning, we see Eivind, lovely, accepting Eivind, take care of Julia, and that night she thanks him for accepting her as herself. BUT. Then we have a big moment, and one I can’t believe I didn’t notice the first couple of times I watched this film. Eivind says he loves her, and she doesn’t say it back. Rather she looks off into the distance, worried. It would appear that Julia will not fall in love with Eivind after all. But now, as we move into the final sequence of Act II, we have another tension: “Will Julia act on that fact?”

And so, we see Aksel begin to re-enter her life. First, she sees him get into a feisty culture war argument on tv, and then she discovers that he has incurable cancer. She is devastated, and perhaps begins to think about what they had again. Which leads to our next scene: a confrontation with Eivind. Now I’ve talked to some people who have taken her side and said that Eivind had no business reading her story, but it was sitting on top of the bin! Unfolded! I don’t know if I would have read it, but when it’s not a diary entry or anything, I would not rule it out. Nor would I blame a partner for doing the same. Anyways, there’s a lot going on here. It’s interesting to note that Julia is at first charmed by the fact that he likes her story, until he makes the mistake of showing that he knows it’s her family. At that, she very quickly turns, and becomes pretty cruel. She derides him for not being literary, which is a horrible, obnoxious thing to do. And then we get to the real crux of it: she won’t relax about it, cos relaxing is his thing. He has no ambition, but she does. And, frankly, Eivind is a saint. He does not react, but admits that he is hurt. So, Aksel was pushing too hard for Julia to grow up, settle down, and become a mother. But Eivind does not push Julia at all. But really, the problem — not really the fault but the problem — here is with Julia. When Eivind reads out her prose, she’s embarrassed by it. After all this time, she has not figured out a way to really express herself on her own terms. She has not found something meaningful to do with herself. And then, we transition to chapter 11, and the beginning of our end, with Julia discovering that she is pregnant. Julia can’t seem to find that settled feeling in a relationship, but now trying to find it outside of a relationship would be harder than ever. Like at so many low points, our protagonist finds herself no longer believing the counterargument, but the argument seems impossible. And so, at minute 93, with 28 minutes left, we end Act II, and we enter Act III.

Act III has a false resolution and a true resolution. In the false resolution sequence — and it’s one hell of a sequence — Julia stays uncommunicative with Eivind, and decides to visit Aksel. We learn that she is taking steps towards her need though, as she has cut off communication with her father. But, without wanting to be too morbid here, there is a real sense of the ticking clock once again, as Aksel now talks not only about his impending death, but also of a youth that is gone forever. Suddenly it’s not just that the future is coming, but that the past is gone. And even if you continue living youthfully, you will cease to be youthful. Aksel tells her that he had still been doing the same things that he used to do, long after they gave him the same feelings they once had. Julia’s time on this Earth will be short lived, and she will need to find some way to grow up, so Aksel tells her: if the father is kind, she should keep the baby. But this is our false resolution. Then, approaching our true resolution, a tearful Aksel reveals that his one regret was not convincing Julia of how great she was. Perhaps then, they would have been more equal partners, but who is to say. At that, Julia goes home and tells Eivind that she’s pregnant, and that she needs time to think. And so it’s time for The Worst Person In The World’s True Resolution: the appropriately titled Chapter 12: Everything Comes To An End. 

Now, this is a slightly unusual final sequence, and I think it’s because this is a hard story to “end” as such. So much of this final act feels like it belongs to Aksel more than Julia, and so much of what happens happens “to” Julia, which appears to make her a little passive in the home stretch. At least at first blush. But I’ll touch on this again later. For now, Julia is very much reconnecting with Aksel in his final days, and it’s worth noting that she is kind of interviewing him while photographing him. She has finally been inspired by Aksel to express herself on her own terms. He wishes that he weren’t dying. Now, he doesn’t care about his art, but would just like to live happily with her. But sadly, it’s too late for that, for them. Julia soon gets a call to say it’s unlikely that Aksel will live through the night. She wanders the streets all night, grief stricken. And then, as before, the sunrise signals another end for her and Aksel. The night is over, and Aksel has most likely passed. Then, during a shower, Julia miscarries. Jesus, wasn’t this a comedy at some stage?! 

But at that, with mere minutes to go, we cut to an Epilogue, and we discover that Julia is now a stills photographer on a film set. Now, this must be a reference to Annie Hall, where the protagonist in a story about a relationship that doesn’t work out ends up on a film set recreating a break up. It’s probably also worth noting that there’s a female actress here struggling to give the male director what he wants. But most importantly, when we first met Julia, she was dropping Medicine for Psychology, and then Psychology for Photography. After interviewing and photographing Aksel, she now directs the actress in a way that the actual director…did not. She helps the actress to use her emotions to help her take the best photograph, combining her initial passions. Which is a nice touch. Julia then, to her astonishment, watches the actress walk out and meet her partner, Eivind, who is holding their baby. Our protagonist goes home, and with a drawing of Bobcat with a female partner on her window sill, she gets to work.

Epilogue

Now, normally I try not to react to criticisms of a film, because if I can, I want to try to overanalyse a film as much as possible on its own terms. But I decided to structure this section on criticisms because I did find them to be an interesting prompt into how to consider the story. So, I’d like to look at two of the main criticisms, and then consider where they might be coming from.  

First of all, on that notion that Julia is overly defined by her relationships, I think that is probably the whole point, even if, admittedly, it does seem a little unnatural that we never see Julia with her own friends. And, this idea is not only presented by the key moments in Julia’s story, but also especially by Eivind. We see Eivind with 3 different partners. When Julia meets him, he’s dating Yogi and environmental instagrammer Sunniva. And so, we see Eivind not only worry about the environment, but become guilt ridden over it. Then, while dating Julia, he insists that he doesn’t want kids, perhaps because of a hangover from Sunniva, or perhaps he’s not ready, or perhaps because Julia has just left a relationship where there was such pressure to have kids. And while Julia is enjoying going with the flow, so is Eivind. Finally, he ends up with the actress that Julia photographs, and with a baby to boot. Of course, we don’t really know the nature of this relationship. But it’s clear that Eivind is at least partially redefined by it. As we all naturally are by relationships. And certainly as Julia is. The story is really her journey to not be defined by her relationships, but to spend the hard time finding out what she wants to do, alone. 

So, relatedly, I think the idea that she has a flat character arc is not really fair either, but it is more interesting — at least for a story structure nerd. We can see through the second act that there is a clear arc here, with Julia moving both towards and away from her Need as one would expect in a story. For her first unconscious move, she does not run straight into the embrace of another man and begins to express herself creatively. At the midpoint, her first conscious move, she breaks up with Aksel and at least contemplates how she needs to be alone to figure herself out. Then, as the honeymoon period ends, she does not embrace that need and falls straight back into a live-in relationship with Eivind. At the lowpoint, it appears like she might never get that time to be alone, as she becomes pregnant. 

So, where does this sense of a shallow arc come from? Well, I think it probably has to do with the ending. The story does feel a little like it stops more than ends. And that’s probably at least partially because so much of the true resolution appears to happen to Julia. Aksel is the one putting everything into context. Then he dies. She also just happens to see Eivind with his new partner. And — most significantly — Julia miscarries. Now, I hate saying this, but purely in story terms, this is kind of, well, ‘convenient’. Before this happens, Julia really has 4 choices: keep the baby and stay with Eivind, keep the baby and leave Eivind, have an abortion and stay with Eivind, or have an abortion and leave Eivind. None of these feel ideal for Julia, so the choice she made would feel truly significant, truly weighty. A character’s arc is defined by choices, and this feels like the biggest choice Julia would have to make. And to some degree, the hardest aspect of that choice is made for her. 

Now, there are real reasons for this. Firstly, I’m hardly the person to be talking about this, but it’s hard to imagine a film ending with an abortion and not becoming about abortion. And this film is not about that. Secondly, this is a film about being buffeted by external factors. Julia begins our story being distracted by unsolvable global problems, Eivind wanders into her life twice, Aksel suddenly gets cancer unusually young, Julia gets pregnant by accident. So it’s in keeping with the story that this might happen to Julia.

Having said all that of course, Julia does make a choice. She makes a choice that she did not make at any other point in the film. She chooses to be alone. If that feels like a stop rather than an end, well, that’s probably because this is a period in life that does not really have a natural end. Youth has gone, but old age is still a ways away. She may or may not meet someone. She may or may not have kids. She may or may not achieve the artistic or professional objectives she has. But what she can know for sure is that she’s tried, that she stood on her own two feet, and gave figuring it all out a real go. 

This has been Mark Overanalyses Film. Somehow I’ve gone 22 episodes without overanalysing a Coen Brothers’ movie, and this aggression will not stand man. So next time, to mark 25 glorious, abiding years, it’s The Big Lebowski. If you enjoyed this episode, please like, rate, follow, recommend, and whatever else it is that’s good for this kind of thing! A special thanks to Mary Kate O’Flanagan who taught me everything I know about film, including these methods. Thanks for listening. Take care of yourselves, and see you soon.