Libby Banks
Human Growth and Development Summer 2014
7/6/2014

The Virgin Suicides For assignment 2, I watched The Virgin Suicides, a 1999 film based on the amazing novel by Jeffrey Eugenides. I had read the book in my younger years (when I was an adolescent girl myself!) and the novel had stayed with me for years. When watching the film for this assignment, I was struck how relevant the movie was to our coursework, and looking at the film with my new knowledge was rewarding and heartbreaking.
The first developmental issue that stuck out for me was how little freedom the girls were given to develop independent identities. The girls are mostly referred to as a monolith ­ “The
Lisbon Girls” ­ and neither the boys who are obsessed with them nor their parents seem to differentiate between them. The most telling examples of this occur within the Homecoming dance sequence and aftermath.
When the boys are deciding which girl to take to the dance, they don’t differentiate between them ­ they essentially randomly assign them. The girls recognize this, and they feel upset about it. Later, and more tragically, Lux’s being late to curfew has dire consequences for all the girls, not just Lux. The parents punish all of the girls for the poor choices of one out of a misguided notion of fairness and anger. They cloister all of them rather than punish the one; leading them to all feel hopeless.

Another part of adolescent development is being able to experiment with sex, drugs, clothing, and new ideas. While ideally these should be done in a safe way where one does not have an opportunity to do anything permanently damaging, this rebellion is a critical part of developing one’s identity, and the mistakes we make in adolescence are formative. In the Lisbon household, the girls are not given the space they need to make mistakes, and when they try to claim that space they are severely punished. Their parents do not give them developmentally appropriate opportunities to explore sexuality, and they treat sex and boys as something to be feared and something that’s the enemy.
The Lisbons also force their daughters to isolate themselves from their peers. During adolescence, peer approval and knowledge from peers becomes very important, and the daughters are discouraged from having friends outside the family and ultimately completely prevented from having friends. Adolescents need to distance themselves from their parents to develop independence, and being unable to have friends outside of their family is ultimately stifling for the girls.
Connected with the complex family relations is the dynamic the Lisbon girls have with their mother and father. Their mother is incredibly dominant and their father is more passive. He is content to let the mother make all the decisions in the household, which, while fine if the decisions are healthy, becomes a totalitarian matriarchy. They both care for their daughters, but he lacks the ability to speak up for them. It was interesting that the mother commented that their house “didn’t lack for love.” It reminded me a lot of
For Your Own Good
, in which parents conduct cruel and abusive punishments and make children lose all agency. These parents think of themselves as loving, but being loving and being a good mother are not the same thing.

Another aspect of abusive parenting we’ve talked about in class that is present in the movie is the secretiveness of the family. The family does not talk about their grief for their youngest daughter who has committed suicide, but instead tries to move past it. They feel like by ignoring and moving on, it will erase the past; however, adolescents and adults need time to grieve and feel loss. When the mother refuses to acknowledge just how dark their life had become, she is losing the opportunity for her daughters to seek help.
Other parts of adolescence that are present in this movie are selfishness/self­centeredness, impulsiveness, and intensity of feelings. We see selfishness and self­centeredness manifest in two ways; the first, when the girls commit suicide and the second in the treatment of the girls by the boys. The boys solely see the girls as mirrors of their own longing and hormones, and there is tremendous irony in them complaining about the girls being selfish for leaving the world.
Likewise, the impulsiveness and the lack of care for the future is evident in the girl’s suicide. When they commit suicide, they are not seeing a possible future but are overwhelmed by the present and feel no way out. This hopelessness is common for many suicidal people, but adolescence amplifies these feelings. Adolescents consider the consequences of their actions much less than older people, and the girls’ suicide pact reflects that.
Finally, the intensity of feelings that adolescents possess is clearly showcased in this film.
Because of the changes that adolescents go through ­ leaving childhood, gaining new independence, falling in love for the first time, and more ­­ it is an emotionally volatile time.
These girls have no healthy outlet for their emotions, and they act out their grief in many unhealthy ways, including promiscuity and emotional isolation.

The Lisbon girls’ suicides in
The Virgin Suicides ultimately reflect an oppressive upbringing that they long to escape from by any means necessary. The tragedy of their loss haunts everyone in their life as they wonder how they could have saved them.