Lars and The Real Girl… Gets Real…
Cuddled up on the couch watching Lars and The Real Girl with The Kid.
MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!!!
DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN LARS AND THE REAL GIRL!!!
I’M SERIOUS!!!
SPOILER!
ALERT!!!
FOR REALS!!
About halfway through, I whisper to The Kid real low and serious-like… “This movie gets a whole lot creepier when you keep in mind that he kills her in the end.”
The Kid, irascibly, “MOM!!! NO!!! MOOOOMMMM!!!!”
Followed by much laughter.
Because she has no soul and finds murder to be a funny, funny, thing.
Me, all facts and observations, “Well… He does…. It’s basically a movie about a guy who uses the awesome power of the Internet to lure an innocent foreign cripple into visiting him.”
The Kid remains unconvinced. I can tell because she’s little miss “disapproving eyebrows.”
I continue on, feeling the parental importance of sharing how the world really is. I tick off the lowdown on the hand where my fact finding fingers of justice live:
“The Real Girl doesn’t speak the language.
He does all the translating.
He’s the quiet church-going white guy in his twenties that no one suspects has such a heinous, stygian, nature.
The whole town is filled with swarth… a seedy underbelly.”
I pause before I drop more weighty truths. The Kid can only take so much at one time, the precious angel.
“They pretty much support him being an executioner.
Of love.
…And also people.”
The Kid shoots me a very unfriendly look.
It is the look she reserves for people who hate cats.
The Kid’s eyebrow intensity is at supreme castigation.
Me, pure love shining through as I just try to educate The Kid about the ways of the world. The ways she, apparently, is not ready to hear about.
But she must!
For she is about to be 18, and she cannot go into the cosmos vulnerable, untrained. “This is what happens when you live too far north, baby. Very common thing… not enough sun and small towns. I’m just saying… Don’t breakdown in a small northern town.”
I release those justice fingers again and count it out for her:
“You’ll end up being held captive by some recluse garage-liver…
And when he’s found you’re no longer useful to him…?
…He drowns you in a lake as frozen as his heart.”
Justice fingers turn into wavy leaves, forgotten in the bleakness of a fall breeze, as I blow on their tips, liberating them from their duty… for a season.
I then further substantiate my words with this unilateral debate ending winner, “That’s just science. Canadians are only happy because they’re constantly killing foreigners. Annnnnd… Done.”
I fold my fingers together as they mark the time until they are needed once more.
…..
Throughout the rest of the movie I prove how messed up Hollywood is by making little comments to point out what Lars is thinking. How he’s just intermissed until he can neutralize The Real Girl without any witnesses…..
Family.
Isn’t it about…. Time?