This is actually the first review I'm writing for the site, so yeah, it's definitely gonna be a little rough around the edges. You see, I really do love this movie, in the most romantically overstated kind of way. I see myself in the character of Woodcock and surprisingly, I see myself a lot in Alma too...
It is a tragedy - this story.A beautiful one, for I know very well about codependency in relationships.
I know it ever so intimately to understand Alma and slightly pray for her paradoxical success in achieving
love, through pain. The pain of her character, without spoiling much of my life, is not a stranger but
a forgotten lesson in love. Most of all, I am pretty sure this story is about the human craving for
connection. It is, after all, what guides most of us... even the most cruel of villains that come to
mind are born out of a lack of proper connection or love. Woodcock is no villain, though he too is
guided by this beautiful concept we are all so enchanted with. Behind his mask of an extremely arrogant,
ungrateful and childish old man, lies the one truth
he tells us throughout the whole movie:
He misses his mom. The eternal manchild. How relatable... Well, then it becomes no challenge figuring out
Alma's purpose right?
Fascinating it is, however, how she managed to take on the assigned role.
She cares too much.
Cares enough to notice how neglected she truly is - like a good (obsessive,
or perhaps, caring) mother, she does NOT leave Woodcock. Alma knows herself.
She knows her own
strength and her true role in that manchild's life, and knowing that... she takes what she supposedly
deserves. Submission. Recognition... and then, love. Is it fair? Of course it isn't.