Kathleen Norris on Grief

Kathleen Norris - AS WE GRIEVE

Grief is a universal human experience, and thus is a staple of films. I consider it a good joke on the audience (and some film critics) that when Last Tango in Paris opened in 1972 people ranted extensively about the controversial sex scenes, explicit enough to earn the film an X rating. But few commented on the film’s true subject, which is grief. Marlon Brando portrays a man whose inability to accept his wife’s death leads him to engage in angry, brutal sex with a stranger. It’s an honest if uncomfortable look at the way some people cope with a grief they find unbearable.