What’s Eating Gilbert Grape
What’s Eating Gilbert Grape is the 1993 Drama starring Johnny Depp and Leonardo DiCaprio. Gilbert Grape (Johnny Depp) is a small-town young man who has lots of responsibilities when it comes to his family. One of his many concerns is his mother (Darlene Cates), who is so overweight that she can’t leave the house, or even the couch. His other concern is his mentally impaired 17-year-old younger brother, Arnie (Leonardo DiCaprio), who is often getting himself into trouble.
This family has been through a lot. The suicide of their father had a huge impact on the family. He was a Vietnam War veteran, with PTSD. He left no note or warning, until one day he was discovered by the family hanging in the basement of the house they currently live in now. This traumatic death has caused Gilbert to play the father role in this family. He takes on full responsibility for Arnie while his sister Amy takes care of their mom.
Most of the town avoids the Grape family. The town seems to have no empathy for this struggling family. Instead, they mock them and treat them as outcasts. Children will sneak over to the house and peek into the window to get a glimpse of their 500lbs mom. This poor family is helpless and have no one besides each other.
Much like most of his films, Leonardo Dicaprio has perfected the kind of lonely, isolated hero that we love so much. His characters are often rich, powerful, and tormented in way. Examples of this would be in The Titanic, Great Gatsby, Romeo and Juliet, and Catch Me If You Can. In What’s Eating Gilbert Grape isolation plays a huge role in Leo’s character. Arnie’s isolation is in part due to his disability. This limits how well other people can relate to him. His family also isolates themselves from the outside world. Each of the family members secludes themselves within their own fear. Their mom playing the largest role in this. She will refuse to leave the house in the fear of the looks she will receive in this small town.
Unlike the usually predictable character that Johnny Depp plays, his role in this movie is completely different but is just as successful. We are used to the Depp with the strange accents and silly hats. Since his performance in 2003’s Pirates of the Caribbean, Depp has been in strictly roles that are just bizarre and quirky versions of Captain Jack Sparrow, but with different make-up. Although this seems to be completely out of Depp’s comfort zone, he does just as good of a job in this drama than he does in his action, adventure, fantasy, comedic movies. The serious, mopey, respectable Gilbert Grape allows us to see his true talent. I do enjoy his wackier side, but this movie gives me the chance to see how truly talented Depp is through the range of characters he is able to portray.
The director of this brilliant movie, Lasse Hallstom has been nominated twice for the Academy Award for Best Director. He has directed many music videos and other movies such as My Life as a Dog, The Cider House Rules, and The Shipping News. Peter Hedges was the screenwriter of this novel, the film version of his own story. What’s Eating Gilbert Grape was originally based on a play he wrote while teaching creative writing.
Freedom
The central theme of this movie that I think Lasse Hallstom was trying to show, is freedom. Within the first five minutes of meeting Gilbert Grape, you can tell something is missing from his life. Living in the small town of Endora, where his house is placed in a field that stretches farther than the eye could see, Gilbert still feels trapped. It’s not that he doesn’t have anywhere to go, it’s that he can’t go. Trailers are constantly passing through town, you can tell that Gilbert wishes to be free just like all these people are. He finds the perfect opportunity to do this when he meets Becky, the essence of free. Becky is around the same age as Gilbert and has been traveling her whole life with her grandmother. She has the ability to go where she wants when she wants, unlike Gilbert who is tied down to take care of his family. Becky allows Gilbert to see the good in a free life.
Although this was good for Gilbert, it caused him to let his guard down with Arnie who needed care almost 24 hours a day. This is shown in the scene where Arnie is left in the bath over night because Gilbert was in a rush to go back to Becky. He let his guard down by thinking Arnie would be capable of getting himself out on his own. As he gets through these struggles of balancing family and his minimal social life, you truly see himself being set free in the end of the movie. This scene represents the beginning of a new life when he burns his mother’s house after she passes away. He is burning down the house that has kept him a prisoner.
Mental illness
This movie also relates heavily to mental illness. Arnie’s disability not only affects him, but it effects the people around him. Arnie gets arrested for climbing the water tower many times after he is warned not to. To him this is all fun and games as long as the police car turns on the sirens and flash their lights. Arnie also lacks the ability to read people’s emotions. When Arnie’s dad is brought up he doesn’t understand that this is a sensitive topic and mocks his sister by shouting “Dad’s dead!” This upsets his mom, but Arnie doesn’t understand why this is not okay to do.
We also see how fragile Arnie is and how his mind and his heart don’t always operate together. He can’t tie the consequence to his action. Although Arnie often hurts people’s feelings without knowing Arnie is in tears after killing a grasshopper by chopping off its head with the mailbox. After this happens he runs to Gilbert very distraught yelling, “I killed him Gilbert, I killed him!”
This effects Arnie because although he has Gilbert and his two sisters to help take care of him this is still kids taking care of kids. Amy being the mother figure and Gilbert being the father prohibits them to be able to figure out their own lives. They have hardly any idea who and what they want to be. This burden of responsibility is holding them back.
Julie Beck, author of the article posted on The Atlantic, when you are an Adult, says “Adulthood is a social construct. For that matter, so is childhood. But like all social constructs, they have real consequences. They determine who is legally responsible for their actions and who is not, what roles people are allowed to assume in society, how people view each other, and how they view themselves.” Gilbert faces these consequences. In this movie Gilbert is scene and treated as an adult by his family, for he is the caregiver of Arnie. Legally he should be considered an adult because he is 24, but he has not had a chance to experience his own life as an adult. In today’s society if you are the typical adult you are likely to be married, have children, and are able to a hold a well-paying job. Without these characteristics the people in the town of Endora do not view Gilbert in the same way his family does.
The social construct of being a child plays a major role in Arnies life. Legally Arnie is and adult just like Gilbert. In certain circumstances he is treated this way, for example, when he is taken to the police station he is treated like a 19-year-old. The problem with this is that Arnie is not mentally an adult therefor he should not be treated as anyone else would in the same situation. Going off of that, Arnie is also treated as a child by the towns people. They laugh at him and look down on him as if he is not capable of realizing their negativity towards him.
Overall, I would strongly recommend this movie. You not only get to see well-known actors play very different characters than you are used to, you also gain empathy for this family and realize how hard some people have it. As a whole, this movie is focused on acceptance and making the most of a bad situation. Going of off that, the movie shows how they get through the obstacles in their lives such as mental illness, autism, conflict, guilt, and responsibility allowing you to gain knowledge on how to get through some of your own life obstacles.