The movie Smooth Talk is based off of Joyce Carol Oates’ story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been.” Smooth Talk is a movie that revolves around the actions of a curious fifteen year old and an extremely concerned mother. The main character, Connie, is a young girl that seems to like to pretend to be someone that she is not. At home she is a typical teenage girl, but when she is out with her friends it is almost as if she is an adult with the way that she dresses and acts. Connie’s mother treats her harder than her older sister June because she feels that Connie is following in her rebellions ways just like when she was younger. To begin with, the major conflict that is in both the movie and the book is, between Connie and her mother. …show more content…
When Connie’s mother was her age, she acted the same way that Connie is acting towards her family now. Her mother used to act out, disobey her parent’s orders, do things with boys that she shouldn’t have done at her age, and more. Connie knows of her mother’s old ways because her older sister, June, is a result of the mother’s actions when she was Connie’s age. Her mother knows that Connie is just like her when she was younger, so she is afraid that Connie will repeat the same actions and mistakes that she made when she was her age. Connie thinks that her mother is too hard on her and she doesn’t understand why her mother treats her differently. The more Connie’s mother badgers her about what she can and cannot do, the more Connie will do the things her mother tells her not to …show more content…
When Connie goes out she tells her mother that she is just going to be with her best friend at the mall all day, she leaves the house dressed conservatively, but when she gets to the mall she changes into something that can catch any boys’ attention. Her and her best friend try to find boys to hang out with then they leave with the boys and meet up at the movie theater when it’s time for them to go home. One day, Connie got caught up with a boy she had meet and lost track of time. When she got to the meet up point, her best friend was nowhere to be found since it was well over the time that they’re supposed to be home. Connie arrived home during very late hours and was met with an angry in the living room. Connie and her mother got into a heated argument and there were many things that were said, that shouldn’t have been
While watching the movie, I could see that the main characters in the book, both their names and traits, were the same in both the movie and book. However, aside from that there were many different as...
Connie, like many teenage girls, is somewhat egocentric, values the opinions of her friends more than her parents, listens to music, and flirts with teenage boys. In this case, juxtaposition is used to reinforce Connie's character archetype. In the beginning of the story, Connie's actions are often juxtaposed with her sister June. Her mother compares the two girls by interrogating Connie with questions, "Why don't you keep your room clean like your sister? How've you got your hair fixed—what the hell stinks? Hairspray? You don't see your sister using that junk." (Oates, 1). This proves that her parents have high expectations from Connie. Connie may feel as if she cannot achieve their expectations, thus she is not good enough. This could explain
She ends up avoiding her mother’s questions regarding the boys she meets. As the boys continue talking to Connie, she tries to avoid him, claiming that she doesn’t know him. His name is Arnold Friend (Oates 1). Character Analysis The character Connie depicts a young girl who cultivates her personal appearance and sexual aspects which only flourishes when she is away from her home and family (Gale Cengage Learning 6).
Connie is only concerned about her physical appearance. She can be described as being narcissistic because "she had a quick, nervous giggling habit of craning her neck to glance into mirror or checking other people's faces to make sure her own was all right" (Oates 148). Connie wants her life to be different from everyone else's in her family. She thinks because she is prettier, she is entitled to much more. She wants to live the "perfect life" in which she finds the right boy, marries him, and lives happily ever after. This expectation is nothing less than impossible because she has not experienced love or anything like it. She has only been subjected to a fantasy world where everything is seemingly perfect. This is illustrated in the story when Connie is thinking about her previous encounters with boys: "Connie sat with her eyes closed in the sun, dreaming and dazed with the warmth about her as if this were a kind of love, the caresses of love, and her mind slipped over onto thoughts of the boy she had been with the night before and how nice he had been, how gentle, the way it was in movies and promised in songs" (151).
Her exposition is painstaking. She sets the scene by making the main character and protagonist, Connie, parallel to an average girl in the sixties. Oates' narrator introduces Connie using elements of description which puts emphasis on the vanity of the main character. Connie's mother is quickly introduced and is used by the narrator to reveal how much disdain her mother has for her vanity. The narrator uses the main character's mother to introduce her sister, June.
Connie was tired of the life she was living and, she was ready to make decisions for herself and to deal with the consequences for them. She knew that if her parents found out about her going to the diner that she would be in trouble. Connie did not care about the consequences for her actions. She felt like it was time to grow up and be a woman. She wanted to start to experiment with her sexuality. Connie wanted boys to start to notice her and talk to her. Connie thinks that guys could be her savior by helping deliver her from the pressure and anxieties from her sister and mother. Her going out on her own makes her realize that she does not have to please anyone, only herself. When Connie and her friend went to the diner she met this guy Arnold. Obviously being with Eddie for three hours in a dark alley and diner was not the best first move for her. This is the one decision that will change her life forever. This was probably the first guy that gave Connie some attention. So obviously she is going to soak him up and just...
The first conflict between Connie and her mother. The writer 's said. "They also examine the psychological principles that underlie Connie’s relationship with her mother and sister, as well as her rebellion, self-centeredness, insecurity, and sexual experimentation"(Oates267). They had a very poor relationship that contributed to her constantly wanting to rebel against what her mother truly
When approached by Arnold Friend at first, she was skeptical but was still charmed by him. As she began to feel uneasy, Connie could have used her intuition to realize that he was trouble. Once she had been engaged by Arnold, her life was over. The influences on Connie and her lack of instilled reasoning led to her down fall. Her family’s fragmented nature was echoed in her actions; consequently, she was unable to communicate with her parents, and she was never was able to learn anything of significance. She felt abandoned and rejected, because no one took the initiative to teach her how to make good decisions. Connie was unable to mature until she was faced with death and self sacrifice. In the end, her situation made it difficult for her to think and reason beyond the position she was in. By not being able apply insight, she fell into Arnold Friends lure. Misguidance by the parents strongly contributed to Connie’s
Connie conveyed herself as attractive, youthful, promiscuous and mature. She loved attention from boys and loved being able to reject them. She found enjoyment in deceiving her parents, flirting with boys and gussying herself up. Because this is a story about Connie, she is the hero. Although she ends up submitting to the villain, Arnold, she can be viewed as heroic for her obedient personality in order to ensure her family’s safety. Her childish and immature manner is revealed when she is confronted by Arnold and adulthood. This is demonstrated in her reactions to sex, “She put her hands up against her ears as if she'd heard something terrible, something not meant for her. "People don't talk like that, you're crazy,"“(Joyce Carol Oates page 6). The topic of sex is casual for adults but Connie finds the topic vulgar and felt completely out of place having a conversation about sex with an older man. She also does not realize how normal the topic of sex is because of her age. This implies she is much more childish than she perceived herself to be. Since the forceful experience she went through with Arnold, Connie now knows she was never too
Oates drew the character of Connie very well - she possesses many of the qualities that teenaged children share. According to developmental psychologists, adolescents become highly critical of siblings, and peer relationships take precedence over familial ties during these years (Feldman, 455). These traits are apparent in Connie’s unflattering description of her older sister June, “…she was so plain and chunky…” (209) and the fact that Connie spends many nights out with friends, but refuses to attend an afternoon picnic with her family (211).
Connie is a round character, “Everything about her had two sides to it, one for home and one for anywhere that was not home”, writes the nararrator. Everything was different when she was not home, her walk, voice, laugh, appearance, and her true self seemed split. In the start of the story, Connie is able to keep these two selves entirely seperate, until her experience with Arnold. Here her sexual, flirtatious and confident “friend self” collides with her sweet, shy, innocent “family self” for the first time. She is unable to handle this collision of her two selves and we see her realize she has lost sight of her identity.
The characters make a big difference in the movie and the book. One thing they both have in common is that Otis Amber and Berthe Erica Crow get married. And that Edgar Jennings Plum and Angela Wexler get engaged instead of Doctor Denton Deere. Also Jake Wexler is a gambler instead of being a bookie.
Connie has the need to be viewed as older and as more mature than she really is, all the while still displaying childlike behavior. She shows this childlike behavior by “craning her neck to glance in mirrors [and] checking other people’s faces to make sure her own was all right” (Oates 323). This shows that Connie is very insecure and needs other people’s approval. Although on one side she is very childish, on the other side she has a strong desire to be treated like an adult. This longing for adulthood is part of her coming of age, and is demonstrated by her going out to “bright-lit, fly-infested restaurant[s]” and meeting boys, staying out with those boys for three hours at a time, and lying to her parents about where she has been and who she has been with (Oates 325, 326). “Everything about her ha[s] two sides to it, one for home and one for anywhere that was not home” (Oates 324). Even her physical movements represent her two-sided nature: “her walk that could be childlike and bobbing, or languid enough to make anyone think she was hearin...
Joyce Carol Oates uses the description of the characters to reveal their purpose in the story and their affect on others. June portrays the family environment Connie lives in and the differences between her and Connie. This leads to Connie’s need for attention from others and acknowledgement of her beauty. She desires attention and to be an adult, but she is stuck in between childhood and adulthood with her daydreams about fanciful romance supplied by music. Arnold Friend causes Connie to confront reality and her struggle between childhood and adulthood. Oates is able to portray Connie’s move from childhood and fantasy to reality and adulthood through her willingly leaving with Arnold Friend – sacrificing herself for her family.
However, as I continued to read the story I began to wonder if maybe Connie’s life was not in any way parallel to my own. I have a younger sister where she has an older sister, but that is where the similarities end. Her mother is always telling her that she should be more like June, her older sister. It seemed to me that June living with her parents at her age was unusual, but the fact that she seemed to enjoy this and was always doing things to h...