Bittermoon | The dark side of emotional codependency.
Director: Roman Polanski
Writers: Pascal Bruckner (novel), Roman Polanski (screenplay)
Stars: Hugh Grant, Kristin Scott Thomas, Emmanuelle Seigner
It is no shocker and no surprise that we all need a little counseling sometimes. Our mother and father’s generation is so used to dealing with mental health problems by ignoring them and eventually passing them by to their offspring, this has resulted in a society that stigmatizes the act of going to emotional therapy. I got to watch this film after a recommendation from a therapist on a session where we talked about emotional codependency and the dark sides of it. I saw this a couple of months ago and, to this day, I can’t figure out if what she wanted was to scare me or to actually make me realize that my emotional attachments are not based on emotional codependency, either way, I was extremely scared and it affected me deeply.
Bitter moon, tells the story of a couple in the midst of their 7-year-wedding anniversary. A couple that it is going to some crisis that involves routine and maybe a decrease in sexual desire. With this context, they decide to take a trip on a cruise and there, he (Hugh Grant) meets a man in a wheelchair with a beautiful, attractive and significantly younger wife. The movie moves a little slow, but the actual story starts when this mysterious man starts telling his story on how he meets and eventually gets married to this beautiful young woman.
The relationship starts very romantic, sexually active and seemingly deeply connected, but quickly turns into hell when he, with his manipulative gestures turns her into a caricature of herself. Having an ups and downs relationship that turns violent and emotionally abusive. He starts beating her, humiliating her and manipulating her into doing whatever he wants, she ends her friendships, cuts her hair, changes her habits, and even stands him walking around the house with other women. The way he pulls control and guilt on her in sickening, to the point where she begs him not to leave her even though he is absolutely abusing her.
He admits that he’s tired of her but never actually leaves her, until he tricks her into thinking they’re going to a vacation and abandon hers in the airplane to her luck. Some time passes and he has a car accident where he gets his legs broken. She hears this and returns to visits him, only to cause him permanent damage and start “taking care” of him. Now she’s playing revenge on him, humiliating him, having sex with other men before his eyes and abusing his physical condition to torture him on a daily basis.
Neither of them wanted to end the relationship, neither of them wanted to seek the proper emotional treatment, neither of them end the violent, sickening and abusive cycle. They just are whiling on living hell before leaving each other. This truly marked my heart and almost traumatized me. I was in a relationship that could very easily turn into that, with the passing of the years. After it ended, I was so confused, I didn’t even know if it was, in fact, a codependency situation or was only a fact of some unsolved issues between us that could be treated healthy, separately, through therapy. This movie made me think that I was sick and that I needed help. It took me some time to even be able to write this because I still get nervous and anxious when I think of it. But the truth is that my relationship never went that far because we both could stop it on time, we both recognized some things that weren’t right and the love between us made us act accordantly. I know, however, not everyone has the same luck that we both had.
I wanted to write this, despite the fact that it was truly difficult because there are maybe a lot of boys and girls going through the same, that may be saved if watching this movie and with the complementary emotional support. Please seek help, you can have a healthy relationship with someone who loves you and be truly happy, I still believe I can reach that point myself, we only need to be strong and aware, see the signs and learn to stop on time. This is for the better, for both sides.
Signs You may Be Emotionally Codependent
Introduction
Emotional health is foundational to our overall well-being, influencing our relationships, mental resilience, and even physical health outcomes. increasingly, clinicians recognize that maladaptive relationship patterns—especially codependency—can have significant and sometimes chronic psychological and medical consequences. Emotional…
Melanie learned to define herself in terms of their feelings instead of her own. If she made them feel good, she was good. If she made them feel bad, she was bad.
