Relevance of the paint thinner episode in Hereditary?
In Ari Aster's Hereditary, there is one scene where Annie tries to explain why her relationship with Peter is fraught. She says that
when he and Charlie were younger, she sleepwalked one night and found a lit match in her hand with all of them covered in paint thinner (like she wanted to kill them)
But I don't get what her sleepwalking has to do with the rest of the movie, and why the paint thinner episode happen? Did it actually happen, or were there sinister forces at play at the earlier time as well? Was it because
Annie never wanted Peter (she was pressured to have him by Ellen) so that he could be a host for Paimon
and psychologically she always had some resentment towards her kids? Unsure here.
Best Answer
Someone on Reddit asked Ari Aster about this in his Reddit AMA:
The more I think about it, the more it seems that Annie’s actions while “sleepwalking” are directly opposing the resurrection of Paimon. For example, the whole thing with the paint thinner; killing Peter and Charlie ruins the cult’s plans for Paimon’s human host, and by killing herself, Annie would end any chances of Grandma having another potential male host in her bloodline (assuming that the host must be from her bloodline).
Anyway, my question deals with what you intended those actions taken by sleepwalking Annie to mean. Is it just a simple subconscious retaliation against this ancient evil? Or maybe divine intervention, not unlike the Greek tragedies that this film is evoking?
I like the idea of divine intervention, but I saw it this way: Annie knows on some buried, suppressed level that her life is not her own, and she is the victim of unthinkable, Machiavellian scheming by her mother. But she cannot look directly that this (let alone inquire about it). It would destroy too much of her inner structure. So, she lives in a kind of denial.
But in her sleep, this part of her is acting out. She tried to set fire to her children to prevent the "resurrection of Paimon," as you say. She even says, in the dream sequence, "I wasn't trying to kill you, I was trying to save you."
That said, it could also be read as Annie's buried desire to kill her children taking hold. After all, she never wanted to be a mother. All her life she has simply being doing "the done thing." The role of a mother is never one she felt comfortable playing.
Pictures about "Relevance of the paint thinner episode in Hereditary?"
Why does the girl in Hereditary click her tongue?
It's a tick to show that she's not 'normal' (in case the bit where she chopped a bird's head off didn't hammer that message home). The click is Paimon's tick, hence why Peter does it later; Charlie's nut allergy, on the other hand, shows the fallibility of a human host.Why did Annie cut her head off in Hereditary?
Annie completely cut ties with her after Peter was born, not wanting him to have any influence over him, but there was an attempt at reconciliation when Charlie was born.Why does Charlie look weird in Hereditary?
She pointed out that while filming Hereditary she was purposely made to look her worst. Now, some people may assume that's how she walks around on a daily basis, which isn't the case. Just like makeup, lighting and CGI are all used to make people look their best, the opposite is true as well.Why does Annie sleepwalk in Hereditary?
Well, it is possible that at a subconscious level, Annie feels that her kids are in danger. And that there is no real way of saving them. Like her brother, an escape from this is death. This is why, in her sleep, she has emptied a can of paint thinner on her kids and her self and tries to set them all on fire.INSANE Hidden Details In HEREDITARY That Make It One Of The Creepiest Horrors EVER
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