Dear Frankie Sparknotes

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Dear Frankie (2004), directed by Shona Auerbach, is a tear-jerking film focused on a young, deaf boy’s struggle in a single parent family. Frankie has never met is father but believes that he is writing to him on the ARCCA boat. When the boat docks where Frankie lives, he wants to meet his father. His mother, who has been lying about his father being on the boat, finds a stranger to pretend to be his father for a day. In the end, the stranger becomes attached to the family which suggests that a relationship might spring up later. The real father, who abused Frankie and his mother Lizzie, dies without seeing Frankie one final time. Frankie eventually learns that the stranger is not his real father but likes him anyways. In this essay, I will …show more content…

It is shown multiple times when Frankie sees one in a fish tank, draws them on his wall, and gives a wooden one to the stranger. There are many different reasons that the seahorse was used. One reason is because the male seahorse carries and delivers the seahorse babies instead of the female. This is exactly opposite of Frankie’s family because Frankie’s true father was abusive and uncaring. Seahorses also mate for live so it is ironic that it is a symbol for Frankie since his parents are divorced. I think the seahorse is the perfect symbol of what Frankie is looking for when he is trying to find is father. The seahorse reflects culture because a lot of children are growing up in single family homes and want a strong father figure to support them. Another theme in this movie is the abusive father that broke a good family is half. Frankie’s father, Danny, has caused nothing but pain for Lizzie and Frankie. He is the reason that Frankie is deaf and also makes Lizzie and her family move constantly so that he won’t find them. Danny has a very short temper and is the only person in the film that curses. In the short amount of time that he was featured in the film, I formed a very strong hatred towards him. I think this theme helps viewers understand the emotions, such as pain, that are felt in homes where domestic violence occurs. The final major theme in this movie was truth. The whole story is based around Frankie finding out that his real father is not the stranger that he met and that his dad is not a good man. His mother lies to him constantly by pretending to be his father so that Frankie won’t find out the truth. At some point during the movie, Frankie does find out that his father isn’t the stranger but plays along with it because he wishes that the stranger was it real dad. I think this movie is meant to show that truth is not always the easiest option by showing a situation where being lied to is

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