Is it any surprise that Forrest becomes attached to him? After all they seem to have a lot in common. There was the park, the dinners, it turns out they both love Madame Butterfly. Forrest is devastated. She tries to force him to stay. She slashes her wrists when he doesn’t. It’s at that point we know he will never be rid of her. And we shouldn’t feel sorry for him. He got himself into it. But we do feel sorry for him after he goes home and Forrest becomes a total maniac. She calls, she comes over, she threatens the daughter and she boils a defenseless bunny rabbit. How can we forgive her after that?
And there is where the controversy and phenomenon started. Women’s groups were horrified that the career woman was demonized into a horrible monster while the housewife was good and virtuous. They were horrified that audiences were asked to root for a philandering husband while the successful woman is overtaken by severe mental illness. It’s hard to say if they really had a point. It’s true that the movie portrays these characters this way, but it can’t really be said that Alex Forrest was meant to be a representation of working women. It would be a stretch to say Fatal Attraction is a anti-women’s lib film meant to keep women at home instead of rising to power in the workplace.
The story as a whole is entertaining but threadbare on true impact. It’s hard to believe Forrest has risen to such a success in her career given her obvious psychological problems, unless we are to believe she was a ticking time bomb. That she was completely sane until that last straw that broke the camel’s back. So what we’re left with is a fairly conventional thriller with good decent acting and several exciting scenes. Archer gives her character the most gravity. Her instantaneous conversion, as her husband reveals his infidelity, from a loving wife to a scorned woman is one of the best scenes in the film. Its subtlety and realism give the movie the touch of depth it was missing. Ellen Hamilton Latzen is also very good as the couple’s young daughter. She is very believable and natural in all her scenes.
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