Review of Sophie's Choice (1982) by Janis A — 05 Nov 2012

What a strange friendship that goes on between Stingo, Sophie, and Nathan. Stingo's a southern boy who moved up to New York to become a writer. The house he lives in is the same place of a Polish woman who holds many secrets and a man who nursed her back to life.

I was pulled through the film due to the secrets the characters hold, plus I legitimately liked being with the three main characters. I wanted to find out if there were any grounds for Nathan's jealousy, even though we know there are no legitimate reasons to believe that Sophie was cheating on him with Stingo.

More likely than not she never once cheated on Nathan, but the secrets that we feel under the surface make us not 100% sure. But when Nathan gets on his jealous rages, like the first night Stingo meets them, we feel a great sense of insanity.

Everything becomes tense, even for the audience. It wouldn't be so if we weren't connected to the characters. That's what works so well with Sophie's Choice. I don't believe that it works on every level.

I don't understand why Sophie ever tells Stingo any of her stories. It would make sense for her to tell him if she had told Nathan, but she tells Stingo everything when she's upset with Nathan.

Perhaps it's because she can't hold onto her secrets any more. If that's the case it needed to be more connected because as of now it just seems like a suggestion and not a fact. I say this only because it makes sense, not because the writing brought me there.

It seems like that should be a pretty huge flaw that would take you out of the film, but it didn't. I'd start questioning why she's actually telling him the story, but the story of her in the concentration camp is so engrossing that it didn't matter after a few moments.

The whole film works on a deep, emotional level that many films never get a chance to reach, which is why the good heavily outweighs the bad. Just look at the scene where Nathan comes home and gives Stingo and Sophie their gifts to celebrate that he might actually get a Nobel Prize, then when he comes home at night he accuses Sophie of being a whore and asks how she was a survivor of Auschwitz.

Probably due to her sleeping around, he supposes. This was the strongest connection between 1947 and Sophie's stories. She tells Stingo a story about flirting with one of the guards, even almost sleeping with him, so that her boy could live.

Is that a bad thing? Not at all, but when Nathan accuses Sophie of sleeping around to survive we understand the deep pain within her. Every guard told her she was beautiful for a Pollack and wanted to sleep with her.

So she should be punished for having blond hair and blue eyes? I think the other part that didn't quite work was when Sophie tries to steal the radio and the little girl catches her. At first she's ready to turn her in, but after Sophie passes out she starts taking care of her.

Why? I never quite understood the sudden change of mood. She didn't believe Sophie's excuses for one second. It was a sweet moment to see humanity working within this little girl, but was it motivated by her character? Later when Nathan disappears with Sophie for a day, Stingo gets a visit from Nathan's brother who's a doctor.

He brings about some news that Nathan is a paranoid schizophrenic who never got his degree in college and is addicted to cocaine. Moreso than discovering Sophie's dad was an outspoken nazi and she has been lying about him this whole time, this one really flips things over.

When he says he has a gun we fear that he will actually kill him. He's no longer a biologist, but a crazy person. This is why the next scene when he's dressed up as a southerner with Sophie looks much more disturbing than if they did this scene in the beginning of the film.

Nathan seems so brilliant up to this point. He reads Stingo's novel, toasts him in a beautiful scene on the Brooklyn Bridge, and can convince him of anything. When Nathan's collected he is Stingo's hero.

We all look up to him. We all want to be like him. That's why the revelation is so disturbing. And when we get to the story of Sophie's choice we feel complete pain. The night she arrives to Auschwitz she's holding her children and tries to get sympathy from a guard that speaks to her.

She's a blond haired, blue eyed devout Catholic; she doesn't belong there. Instead of the guard feeling sympathy, he comes back and makes her choose which child they will take away from her: her daughter or son.

When she can't choose the guard has both of them taken away, then she makes the choice of her daughter, so they leave the son and take her little girl while we hear her screaming the entire way. You don't have to be a mother to understand the pain in this scene.

In fact, I watched it from the little boys point of view. How would I feel if my mother chose for my sister to die? How could I live with that? Well unfortunately her son doesn't live due to some kind of illness that breaks out in the children's camp.

But those screams haunt her every single day. She tells herself she's not a good person and she could never be a mother again. We see her happy quite often, but the pain that haunts her must be unbelievable.

I don't know if I fully believe that Sophie would go back to Nathan after knowing he is a paranoid schizophrenic who will most likely kill her. He saved her and she believes that she can save him, but even after this huge revelation? Perhaps she can't see where else her life could go.

Stingo wants her to go south with him, but after their night of passion she says she can't go with him. She can't be a mother ever again because she's not fit for it. Her past haunts her more than she has let on throughout the film and once it starts poking it's head out the guilt starts to take over.

It's an emotionally heavy film, but also very human. We feel happiness and there's plenty of comedy with Nathan and Sophie, then there's the deep sadness that we all know will come. It's a coming of age story with a dark truth that most of us could never bear.

And of course this has some of the best performances of all time from Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline. Sophie's Choice is a film not to be missed by any serious moviegoer.