Nell

652 Words2 Pages

Nell

1) The loss of Nell's twin sister had a dramatic effect on her. Nell and May were raised in a secluded environment with no outside contact. As a result, May and Nell became very close emotionally and were an integral part in each others lives. When May died, Nell lost part of her life as well which resulted in vivid memory replay. A good example of this is when Nell was turning around in circles by herself but, in her mind, she was turning around in circles with her missing half. At the end of the movie, the evidence of the importance of May in
Nell's life was still evident as Nell played will Jerry's daughter on the rocks that May and her once played on. The movie did portray what is generally believed about twins. The loss of one had a dramatic effect on the other.
They had their own twin speech and their own games. At the end of 20 plus years,
Nell still felt the loss of her twin sister.
2) The expert psychologist in the movie believed that Nell was mentally retarded and had made a small amount of intellectual development as a result of being raised in seclusion. Fortunately, they were wrong. The speech that Nell gave in the courtroom proved that she had developed intellectually. While the language that she used was different, Nell still gave a good list of very abstract ideas that someone who is mentally retarded could not possibly comprehend. Nell understood why she was different saying that she was raised in a small world and knew small things unlike the large things found in the city of
Charlotte, N.C. This proved that Nell was very capable of living by herself and taking care of herself.
3) The experts, in the beginning of the movie, said that Nell was not capable of making the correct judgments to make in the world by herself. They did not believe that Nell had the wisdom to make the correct choices in life situations. It seemed evident to me that Nell already possessed more than enough wisdom to make it on her own. After all, she basically took care of her crippled mother all by herself.
4) Nell is not mentally retarded. Nell was raised in seclusion with her twin sister and a crippled mother. The things that Nell learned were obtained socially from a woman that had loss the use of part of her body. The body language that Nell had learned were obviously learned from observing her mother. For an outside viewer Nell must have looked like she was mentally

Open Document