Thoroughbreds - Friendship

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Silver Snake

Magician of NUF|Show-off|Awkward|Genius
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I recently watched this film. In the simplest terms, it was about two wealthy young adults plotting to kill one of their fathers. But to me it was about friendship. Remember these two things: People will always prefer to hate than to love, and people will always prefer to believe what they are told before thinking about it for themselves. These two things, they make friendship very difficult. Oh, and a third line I simply liked in the film, "The only thing worse than being incompetent,or being unkind, or being evil, is being indecisive."

But first, let's define friendship. The actual definition is in no doubt long and complicated, but I'll simply simmer it down to one word: trust.

The two main characters are Amanda and Lily. Amanda is the self-proclaimed sociopath, and Lily is the girl who wants to kill her step-dad. I won't go into the reasoning of she wants to kill, as as far as I'm concerned, she's completely in the wrong. I mean, she basically wants to kill him because he's an asshole. Okay, moving on.

Amanda and Lily were close friends as children but grew apart as they grew up. Move to modern day, Amanda shows up at Lily's house for tutoring lessons, but in truth Amanda's mother was worried about her daughter, as she often seems unresponsive and antisocial, so she paid Lily in hopes of helping Amanda.

During this first tutoring lesson is when Amanda tells Lily, who's trying to comfort Amanda about her recently dead horse, that she doesn't feel anything, like emotions like joy or guilt. And that being unfeeling doesn't make her a bad person, just that she needs to work harder to be good. And that she had fooled herself into thinking she was normal for so long only because she was so good at observing and copying other people's emotions. It's quite convincing, isn't it? It really sounds like something a sociopath would say. But you ask me, "Isn't she a sociopath?" No good sir, or madam, no she is not. But we'll get to that part later.

Now Amanda is intelligent and morally loose enough to figure this all out on her own, and when told what she knew to Lily, Lily at first denies wholeheartedly, trying to save face.

Afterwards, Lily invites Amanda back for another study session, this time for no charge, stating, "I only wanted to see you, " when asked by Amanda. Is anyone confused by my plot summary? I would imagine people who haven't seen the movie to be. Oh well. Amanda then observes how much Lily hates her stepdad. Lily is again, at first in full denial and asks Amanda to leave.

Lily then insults Amanda about how much less wealthy she is or how she doesn't have any friends, really, I can't recall what exactly it was, anyways, Amanda then answers the question they were reviewing during their earlier session, citing how she only knew because a friend had always told her when a choice has the word the ambivalent in it, it's always correct, referring to Lily as that friend.

Lily asks in disbelief to Amanda, "You're not hurt?" And Amanda answers in her usual nonchalant voice, "That's the first honest thing you've said to me." Which leads to Lily opening up and saying what she really thinks. And blah, blah, blah, they seem to become friends, watching movies and hanging out together.

Amanda actively evokes friendship and honesty in order to get closer to Lily. And Lily attempts to hurt Amanda when she was asking her hate for her father, something she didn't want to share or admit.

I'm going to skip the rest of the movie and just tell you how it ends. Lily kills her stepfather, framing Amanda. But how did it get to this point!? you ask. I thought Lily was the morally upright one! you say. I thought they were such good friends! you say.

Oh, god, my fucking arm hurts. I'll write a part 2, probably. Just go watch the movie if you want to have any idea what I'm talking about.