Synopsis :: Essays Papers

Synopsis Both the movie and the book should be approached as a mystery that unfolds. It is written realistically but has a great deal of mystical overtones throughout the story. Both the movie and the novel begin in the middle of the story which in the beginning may be slightly confusing to either the movie go’er or the reader. Once the story has gone full circle it comes together in and attempts to question some primal beliefs as freedom, love, self worth, and the â€Å"natural† instinct for a mother to protect her child. Here is a brief summary of what has happened prior to the novel and movie’s opening. Mr. Garner purchases a 13-year old black slave girl named Sethe in order to assist his wife by doing the routine jobs around the house. Sethe is the only female slave owned by Mr. Garner who has five other male slaves – three Pauls, Halle, and Sixo. Sethe marries Halle and gives birth to four children. While she is pregnant with her fourth child, the six adult slaves decide to escape the household. Her three children make it to safety due to the aid of a runaway slave woman but Sethe waited for Halle, which caused her to get caught. She is then brutally raped and severely beaten by the slave owners but Sethe does eventually manage to escape without Halle. Sethe makes it out of Kentucky and gave birth to â€Å"Denver† the night before she crosses the river to Ohio. For 28 days Sethe and her children happily live with Halle’s mother, Baby Suggs, but she is soon found by the slave-owner who had come to retrieve them. To avoid a return to slavery, Sethe decid es to kill her children and herself. She is only able to kill her toddler, later known as â€Å"Beloved†. At the novel and films opening, which takes place after slavery has been abolished, the entire family is tortured by the ghost of the baby girl haunting the house, and the Black Community has turned their back on Sethe for her seemingly horrendous actions. Observations The character Sethe is presented as a former slave woman who chooses to kill her baby girl rather than allowing the child to be exposed to the physically, emotionally, and spiritually oppressive horrors of a life spent in the confines of slavery.