Teenage suicide was not unknown before the 1990s, but its increasing cases during this period led people to recognize the problem. Schools even began posting materials to educate students and parents about the phenomenon. the virgin suicides tackles this sensitive issue head-on. Sofia Coppola combines elements of her own style with those of classic film noir to show how these young people become so alienated in a world they barely know or understand. Through the eyes of five sheltered teens, Coppola opens up a dark universe of isolation.
From the beginning of the film, it is recognized that the five Lisbon girls died before reaching adulthood. A small group of boys, now men, from the Lisbon neighborhood have never forgotten the mysterious sisters whom they have never fully deciphered. One of the men narrates the film and informs the viewer that he and his friends still meet at all the high school reunions and birthday parties to discuss the fate of the girls in Lisbon.
The film then flashes back to their childhood around 1975 and features the girls as they get out of their family’s van. Cecilia is the youngest at 13, preceded by Lux, Bonnie, Mary, and Therese, who were all a year older than the others. All the girls look so young, innocent and beautiful. However, it is soon revealed that Cecilia has just been released from the hospital after a suicide attempt.
Cecilia begins to see a therapist who recommends that the Lisbon stricts allow their daughters to have a party to cheer the girls up and allow them to interact with boys and girls their own age. Cecilia is upset by a group of her classmates making fun of a boy with Down syndrome. She feels that he will never really belong to society, so she runs upstairs and jumps out of the window. Her second suicide attempt is successful as she lands on a spiked wrought iron fence. The rest of the film deals with Lisbon’s struggle to cope with this new reality. In the end, the remaining sisters decide that Cecilia was right about the world being a desolate and lonely place where existence itself is useless, so they decide to join her by taking her own life.
Despite the virgin suicides It is not a classic film noir, it is undeniable that Coppola was influenced by the ideas that it brings to mind. The mood of some scenes, for example, has parallels with that of film noir. After all, Coppola intends to take the audience into the bizarre and heavy world in which these doomed girls live. Both the suicide scenes and the scene where Trip leaves Lux in the middle of the soccer field after having sex with her evoke a sense of unease and inconceivability that is definitely characteristic of film noir. the virgin suicides it is also influenced by noir themes and style. The film is mainly about these teenage girls who feel separated from the crowd, locked in the half-reality that was their home. Everything in the Lisbon house is monotonous and gray. There is never any direct sunlight or high profile lighting inside the Lisbon house. It’s like the girls are covered in cobwebs like little porcelain dolls kept in a basement somewhere. Coppola uses light throughout the film to symbolize life and change, such as time-lapse cutaways outdoors with the sun shining in the background. This also shows that things outside are changing, but the girls in Lisbon are forced to stay stuck in their rooms.
the virgin suicides it also boasts a particularly avant-garde score for the time period it was meant to represent. Track titles include “Cemetery Party”, “Dirty Trip”, and “Bathroom Girl”. These are songs Mrs. Lisbon would definitely not allow her children to hear. Coppola even highlights this by showing Lux burning all of her rock CDs at the hands of her mother. This represents the authority that the girls’ parents still have over their lives, but the score that still plays throughout the film represents their struggle to make a name for themselves. Maybe the girls had made it and were just being suffocated. However, most likely, the girls saw no hope of living in a future that they considered lonely, uncomfortable, and unfulfilling.
the virgin suicides departures from noir and more modern film conventions are also noted. Lux Lisbon is not the classic femme fatale of film noir. She knows her sex appeal and she knows she can use it to her advantage, but she’s not trying to fool the men she sleeps with. Lux is simply trying to justify what happened with Trip. She had sex with him after her homecoming dance because she thought he cared about her, and then left her asleep on the football field. Lux, only fifteen years old, was really affected by this. She then reacts by trying to prove to herself that sex means nothing. She then she would be fine if she lost her virginity to Trip for no good reason.
The story of the ill-fated Lisbon sisters needed to be told in a modern context, while the world they live in and the experiences they have are sometimes noir. Therefore, a true fusion of a few different styles and genres was required. Sofia Coppola does a wonderful job of blending film noir conventions with her own thematic style of directing. the virgin suicides. The film’s music and lighting are similar to film noir, as is the overall theme of the film and its setting where the days blend together and even the sex is meaningless. However, neither sister looks quite like a classic femme fatale. Also, guys can be like young detectives, but they don’t have ulterior motives or ulterior motives. His respect and amazement for the Lisbon sisters is sincere, and that is something that cannot exist in a film noir.