The Jarrett Family In The Film Ordinary People

In the movie Ordinary People, the Jarrett Family seems like a normal family with the Mother Beth, Father Calvin, and their son Conrad. Even though they seem like a happy family, in reality they have lost a family member and have unresolved issues and conflicts. Conrad’s brother Buck died in a boating accident and Conrad survived and feels major guilt that he is alive and Buck isn’t.This results in an overall awkward/uncomfortable and cold environment especially for Conrad. If they had used conflict management it could’ve helped resolve the issues and possibly kept their family together. The Jarrett family seems to either act out in fight or flight on each other and others. Conrad and his parents could have used conflict management strategies like mutual purpose to help resolve the tension and keep the family together.

Beth and Calvin’s son

Also, he does act out in fight sometimes, but has mostly been quiet and avoids the issues. It is easy to say that he wants his family to get along again, but seems lost on how to do it. An example is during the swim team conflict, he starts using some attacking language like cussing. Once again, he could use mutual purpose and creating safety to lessen the intensity of the situation. Also, when he tells a friend about Conrad sees a Psychiatrist Beth freak out and tell him he should not tell people their family business. To help this he could use contrasting to show that he understands why she does not want him to do that. In conclusion, the Jarrett family has unresolved issues and grief that has not been properly handled, which is causing the stress in their relationships. To help them handle these issues they could have used, mutual purpose, creating safety, contrasting, working on their self, and dealing with their grief. Using these could have helped Conrad’s love and belonging needs and could have saved their relationship as a