Review of Shoot the Moon

For me the key to this great film was the scene where Finney and Keaton end up in bed together. In their conversation at this tender but honest moment after their marriage has ended, they wonder aloud what happened to them. He says, "I'm not a kind person." She says, "I'm not kind either." These soft spoken admissions, amid the chaos of the violence, and screaming emotional upheaval woven through the film, provided an answer to what went wrong in the marriage. It's clear they still love each other --the whole film is an illustration of this bond, and he says so to his daughter near the end of the film. But they've run into the mundane problems that eat away at long term marriages without means of overcoming them. What are these means suggested by the film? Kindness and compassion. Neither has kindness toward or compassion for the other. They love their children, and they're "good" people, not immoral. But they have no compassion, not even for their children. Without compunction they say and do things in front of the children that can harm them for life. Neither has any compassion for the other's suffering, or any ability to put themselves in the other's shoes. So at the end (SPOILER) when he lies bloody and beaten with his hand up for comfort from her, she refuses to take his hand, and the camera freezes on this moment.