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| this scene reminds me of that one shot of the great blue whale on the first episode of blue planet where it looked impossibly lonesome, 'dwarfed by the vast ocean' even though it is the largest animal to ever live on planet earth. here she is in a confined bathtub instead of the vast ocean. there is something about vulnerability and aloneness and facing up/down in the water (thinking of that one scene in virgin suicides) that is reflective of the self and the seemingly vacant world around. speaking of bathtubs, a lot of films use these in critical moments of self reflection (lovely bones - after washing off blood, black swan - which is heavily inspired by perfect blue, even thomas demand's bathtub recreation...) |
"Requiem for a Dream" and "Perfect Blue" bathtub scene
"In the play, Blanche DuBois seems to have an obsession with bathing. She takes multiple baths a day saying, "I take hot baths for my nerves. Hydro-therapy, they call it" (Williams 8. 134). Although Blanche claims she bathes to calm her nerves, the real reason behind her excessive bathing is to cleanse herself from her past. Bathing symbolizes Blanche's guilty conscience. While living in Laurel, Mississippi, Blanche made a few costly mistakes that she wishes to forget and these mistakes constantly made her feel guilty and dirty, which explains why she feels the need to bathe so frequently. Sadly, a physical bath cannot clean a person's conscience or mental state, so Blanche continuously bathes herself with hopes of becoming clean and guilt-free once again."
"One symbol within this play is Blanche's trunk. Filled with all of Blanche's possessions that she has collected through the years. She claims "everything I own is in that trunk" (Williams 2. 41) and becomes extremely upset when Stanley starts rooting through it. The trunk represents Blanche's past, both the good and bad moments of it. Blanche's ultimate goal was to start fresh, to create a new life in a new place, and to forget about all her previous mistakes. The only thing that she kept from her previous life was her trunk and in the beginning of the play, when Stanley grew curious of what actually happened to Belle Reve, he dug through Blanche's trunk, he dug through her past, he looked into her previous life in order to find her mistakes and later on, that is exactly what he did."
in streetcar named desire she'd bathe a lot, I remember in english class that was heavily regarded as a symbol of cleansing her past, sins, etc.
material things: