A scary thing happened on the way to the Movie Forums - Horrorcrammers

was death. I mean, in the sense that, yeah, he's trying to do well by his family but he's so flawed the only way he can do it is by sacrificing himself. The family is pulling for him to come through because he's their husband and father, they want him to come through this and be the man they hoped he would be but in the end, all he can do is sacrifice himself to save them. And that's really his only redemption.
That's how I remember it, anyway.
If that's right, I think what the movie was trying to do, which I understood coming from a troubled family, was dangle the possible redemption arc but show that he actually just isn't built for redemption, he can get off the ground but he can't keep it in the air, he will always fail and let them down, and so the film, kindly, gives him the opportunity of self-sacrifice, a form of redemption that only takes strength in the moment and gives him the opportunity to show that, despite all of his seemingly selfish behaviors, he actually does love them more than himself. So he is redeemed but he cannot stay to live out his redemption but their memory of him will be that, in the end, he gave his life for theirs.

was death. I mean, in the sense that, yeah, he's trying to do well by his family but he's so flawed the only way he can do it is by sacrificing himself. The family is pulling for him to come through because he's their husband and father, they want him to come through this and be the man they hoped he would be but in the end, all he can do is sacrifice himself to save them. And that's really his only redemption.
That's how I remember it, anyway.
If that's right, I think what the movie was trying to do, which I understood coming from a troubled family, was dangle the possible redemption arc but show that he actually just isn't built for redemption, he can get off the ground but he can't keep it in the air, he will always fail and let them down, and so the film, kindly, gives him the opportunity of self-sacrifice, a form of redemption that only takes strength in the moment and gives him the opportunity to show that, despite all of his seemingly selfish behaviors, he actually does love them more than himself. So he is redeemed but he cannot stay to live out his redemption but their memory of him will be that, in the end, he gave his life for theirs.

he goes up to the top of the castle and is clearly thinking about committing suicide.

But the arc of events actually does lean more toward redemption.

So, yes, he hooks up with the prostitute, defensively saying that it was because his wife was denying him sex.

But then once the investigation gets going, he is the one who figures everything out. He is the one who figures out that the boy never died and that the coffin was empty. He's the one who figures out that the duchess kept and tormented the boy to get revenge on the father for leaving them.

Then he's explaining this all to the wife and the police, and the way that they behave toward him makes THEM seem like the dumb ones.

So he gets hauled away where he's interrogated by the police, before mounting an escape to go back and rescue his family.

His wife and daughter, who were willing to fight and run and stab are reduced to crying and clutching each other once he reappears, where he sacrifices himself by throwing himself off the roof cuffed to Giorgio.

he goes up to the top of the castle and is clearly thinking about committing suicide.

But the arc of events actually does lean more toward redemption.

So, yes, he hooks up with the prostitute, defensively saying that it was because his wife was denying him sex.

But then once the investigation gets going, he is the one who figures everything out. He is the one who figures out that the boy never died and that the coffin was empty. He's the one who figures out that the duchess kept and tormented the boy to get revenge on the father for leaving them.

Then he's explaining this all to the wife and the police, and the way that they behave toward him makes THEM seem like the dumb ones.

So he gets hauled away where he's interrogated by the police, before mounting an escape to go back and rescue his family.

His wife and daughter, who were willing to fight and run and stab are reduced to crying and clutching each other once he reappears, where he sacrifices himself by throwing himself off the roof cuffed to Giorgio.