Ordinary People Movie

                                                           Ordinary People Movie

       1.) Ordinary means simple, plain, normal and that was  what I expected the Jarrett family in the movie Ordinary People to be. Sure they are a middle-class family who are well rounded off and are able to support themselves but it is unbelievable that all they can only do is to be perfect,  which was what the mother Beth, a perfectionist wanted it to seem like. Real fact is that the title is not ironic but sincere. The Jarrett's are ordinary people just like everyone else. People are not perfect and every family in my own opinion are dysfunctional in their own ways. Tragic and unpleasant events are bound to happen in everyone's life and I believe it challenges our strength and patience. Some are able to handle tragic events while others cannot but overall it is still normal. 

         2.) Conrad the last born of the family suffers from Post- Traumatic Stress Disorder from witnessing the death of his older brother buck. He has reoccurring dreams of the event in the first fifteen minutes of the movie where he screams for his brother as he drowned in the water. He also becomes anti-social and avoids his friends because they also were close to buck and I recall a scene where he tells his friend Joe in the car that it hurts too much to be around him. Conrad also has difficulties sleeping which he mentioned to Dr. Berger about his lack of sleep and masturbating in order to fall asleep.  Besides Post- Traumatic Stress Disorder I also thought Conrad was going through Survivor Guilt because he tried to commit suicide. He also talks to His Psychiatrist about it being his fault for the death of his brother and staying on the boat rather than saving him. Towards the end of the movie, Conrad was able to resolve his feelings. The death of his friend Karen caused him to panic and have flashbacks of the incident.  He goes to Dr. Berger to talk about it and the interesting part of it was Gestalt Therapy and role-playing occurred. Dr. Berger acts as if he was Buck saying that he let go of Conrad's because he was tired and was not as strong as him. The role play allowed Conrad to express his feelings towards his death resolving his situation.

       3.) Conrad quits the swimming team for many reasons. He did not want to swim anymore because he did not think he was good at it and he no longer liked the people on the team as well as his coach and his rude comments. Most importantly his older brother was the star of the team and he did not want to be involved with it any longer.

     4.)  Freud's main defense mechanisms are Rationalization, Repression, Projection , Identification, Displacement, Regression, Reaction Formation and Denial which are all used to cope with anxiety. Beth used Projection which is to place your own thoughts, feelings or motives on someone else. An example of this was when she found out that Conrad had quit the swimming team and she felt as though he only did it only to hurt her when it was not even his intention. She also employed Reaction Formation which is to behave from the opposite of how one truly feels. Throughout the movie she had been brushing off conversations on bucks death and had been acting as if it did not bother her at all. There was an instance in where Beth and Conrad was having a conversation outside of their home about buck wanting a dog and she automatically tried to change the subject and talk about their neighbor. Whereas in another seen she goes to Conrad's room and had a sad expression on her face while spaced out looking at buck's picture.  Another is Denial which is used mostly to cope with grief. She yells at Calvin in the car for telling a friend about Conrad seeing a psychiatrist. She did not want people to know that something was actually wrong with her family and I am sure she was trying to make herself believe that. Another was when she got into another argument with her husband about  not wanting to do a family therapy because as always, she was in denial that nothing was wrong when in fact she was suffering inside.