Full disclosure: my mother suicided and a sister attempted via OD (like Ruth), which landed her in a coma for a week. Personally, I've struggled with clinical depression for the majority of my 54 years - even as a child.
I didn't care for this film whatsoever. It comes across as a vanity project for Hope. Her deceased sister Ruth is the faded vehicle off-center, seen m/l as a stereotype: brilliant, beautiful (in the eye of the beholder), but troubled and ultimately doomed. Think Van Gogh and Sylvia Plath, and you'll be heading in the right direction. Oddly, however, this doc is actually less about Ruth than it is about Hope. She's in virtually every scene and her doppelgänger likeness to Hope is confusing at first. Is that the dead Ruth in the photo or Hope? We see Hope going moving a lot of her sister's things from storage unit to an expansive NYC loft - seemingly rented only for the purpose of reorganizing and examining Ruth's belongings. This is where I felt the first pangs of befuddlement. I absolutely understand wanting answers when a loved one suicides. Countless people kill themselves every year and leave little or nothing behind to explain their act of ultimate self-destruction. Second only to murder, suicide is the ultimate taboo in the western world and we want to know WHY, which equates to the more primal "HOW COULD YOU do that to yourself, to your friends, to ME ME ME?" There's simply no mystery in Ruth's suicide. She left behind copious materials detailing her feelings and reasons right up to the end. Multiple letters/notes, stacks of journals, photographs - even sticky notes attached to other forms of self-expression! Ruth seems to have been the ultimate navel-gazer, and that disquieting quality existed alongside a voracious need to be loved. Enough was never enough for her, according to family, friends, and associates. She was a bottomless well of need. Since that well could never be filled (and she recognized this), she ultimately decided to throw herself down it.
I saw similarities between Ruth and her sister. Hope is a recovering alcoholic of many years sobriety at the beginning of the film. As she becomes more involved in analyzing Hope, she 'falls off the wagon.' I wanted to feel compassion for her at this point, but my gut was telling me her return to booze was m/l an affectation to add drama. I mean, it's kind of hard to compete with suicide - right? For most alcoholics, a slip-up almost always leads to a full-blown dive into the sewer and a long, hard, climb back out. For Hope, it's almost dainty. She goes into a light-filled, gentile establishment and orders a double vodka on the rocks, two olives. She films herself drinking it, of course. Not much later, her husband follows her around his parents' home as she seeks out more vodka. They engage in a weirdly cerebral, removed conversation about Hope's mission. Then she has to get a glass for the vodka because her parents-in-law wouldn't appreciate her "lips on their bottle, would they?" Hope is in control, although she'd have your believe she's so distraught about the Ruth project that she's not. In a very odd way, I think Hope is envious of Ruth's ability to garner attention . . . all the while making a film - ostensibly - about her. And that's the rub of why I didn't care for this film: it's not really about Ruth anyway, it's about HOPE. Ruth is just a great excuse for HOPE to do some navel-gazing of her own.
The fact is the sisters were/are products of urban privilege and narcissists in their own ways. Hope is just more functional out here in the world, that's all. I think Ruth might have, and Hope could still benefit from looking outside - and this isn't an inference to religion (ifelong atheist here) for some perspective on life AND death. Neither sister is/was the center of the universe. It's a good thing to know that, imo.
My mother blew her brains out with a .357 Magnum in 1979. I wasn't quite 16, living in another state with my aunt & uncle. Mom was severely bi-polar (or whatever term is in use nowadays.) She refused to take Lithium or attend therapy. HER family - including my uncle, her brother - was small, cold, and upper-middle-class WASP-y. Outside of spotty monetary help, there was no warmth, acceptance, or support. They just wanted her to knock it off, pull herself up by her bootstraps, or whatever. Go ahead and pick your analogy. Of course, that approach never works. On the other hand, all the love, attention, and support in the world may not help, either - as Ruth's life and death demonstrates.
If you want to get an idea of the span and impact of suicide, I recommend www.suicidememorialwall.com. There you will find the faces of everyday people who killed themselves. Kids, the elderly, male, female, every color, age, & creed. For many of them, there are memorial pages linked - usually put up by family members. These suicides are your neighbors, classmates, the guy who works down the road. They're not famous/infamous and nobody makes films about them. They were part of a world in which most of us exist. Take a look, do some reading, think about them. My mother is there, but I won't tell you how to find her on the site. Just know that she existed for a while - that's enough.
I didn't care for this film whatsoever. It comes across as a vanity project for Hope. Her deceased sister Ruth is the faded vehicle off-center, seen m/l as a stereotype: brilliant, beautiful (in the eye of the beholder), but troubled and ultimately doomed. Think Van Gogh and Sylvia Plath, and you'll be heading in the right direction. Oddly, however, this doc is actually less about Ruth than it is about Hope. She's in virtually every scene and her doppelgänger likeness to Hope is confusing at first. Is that the dead Ruth in the photo or Hope? We see Hope going moving a lot of her sister's things from storage unit to an expansive NYC loft - seemingly rented only for the purpose of reorganizing and examining Ruth's belongings. This is where I felt the first pangs of befuddlement. I absolutely understand wanting answers when a loved one suicides. Countless people kill themselves every year and leave little or nothing behind to explain their act of ultimate self-destruction. Second only to murder, suicide is the ultimate taboo in the western world and we want to know WHY, which equates to the more primal "HOW COULD YOU do that to yourself, to your friends, to ME ME ME?" There's simply no mystery in Ruth's suicide. She left behind copious materials detailing her feelings and reasons right up to the end. Multiple letters/notes, stacks of journals, photographs - even sticky notes attached to other forms of self-expression! Ruth seems to have been the ultimate navel-gazer, and that disquieting quality existed alongside a voracious need to be loved. Enough was never enough for her, according to family, friends, and associates. She was a bottomless well of need. Since that well could never be filled (and she recognized this), she ultimately decided to throw herself down it.
I saw similarities between Ruth and her sister. Hope is a recovering alcoholic of many years sobriety at the beginning of the film. As she becomes more involved in analyzing Hope, she 'falls off the wagon.' I wanted to feel compassion for her at this point, but my gut was telling me her return to booze was m/l an affectation to add drama. I mean, it's kind of hard to compete with suicide - right? For most alcoholics, a slip-up almost always leads to a full-blown dive into the sewer and a long, hard, climb back out. For Hope, it's almost dainty. She goes into a light-filled, gentile establishment and orders a double vodka on the rocks, two olives. She films herself drinking it, of course. Not much later, her husband follows her around his parents' home as she seeks out more vodka. They engage in a weirdly cerebral, removed conversation about Hope's mission. Then she has to get a glass for the vodka because her parents-in-law wouldn't appreciate her "lips on their bottle, would they?" Hope is in control, although she'd have your believe she's so distraught about the Ruth project that she's not. In a very odd way, I think Hope is envious of Ruth's ability to garner attention . . . all the while making a film - ostensibly - about her. And that's the rub of why I didn't care for this film: it's not really about Ruth anyway, it's about HOPE. Ruth is just a great excuse for HOPE to do some navel-gazing of her own.
The fact is the sisters were/are products of urban privilege and narcissists in their own ways. Hope is just more functional out here in the world, that's all. I think Ruth might have, and Hope could still benefit from looking outside - and this isn't an inference to religion (ifelong atheist here) for some perspective on life AND death. Neither sister is/was the center of the universe. It's a good thing to know that, imo.
My mother blew her brains out with a .357 Magnum in 1979. I wasn't quite 16, living in another state with my aunt & uncle. Mom was severely bi-polar (or whatever term is in use nowadays.) She refused to take Lithium or attend therapy. HER family - including my uncle, her brother - was small, cold, and upper-middle-class WASP-y. Outside of spotty monetary help, there was no warmth, acceptance, or support. They just wanted her to knock it off, pull herself up by her bootstraps, or whatever. Go ahead and pick your analogy. Of course, that approach never works. On the other hand, all the love, attention, and support in the world may not help, either - as Ruth's life and death demonstrates.
If you want to get an idea of the span and impact of suicide, I recommend www.suicidememorialwall.com. There you will find the faces of everyday people who killed themselves. Kids, the elderly, male, female, every color, age, & creed. For many of them, there are memorial pages linked - usually put up by family members. These suicides are your neighbors, classmates, the guy who works down the road. They're not famous/infamous and nobody makes films about them. They were part of a world in which most of us exist. Take a look, do some reading, think about them. My mother is there, but I won't tell you how to find her on the site. Just know that she existed for a while - that's enough.