Swimming Alone

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Bill reinforces his families' low self esteem by constant negativity. Muriel's desire to get married is at some level her opportunity to escape this environment.
Throughout the film, Muriel demonstrates avoidance behaviour. Music plays a large part of this process and becomes a symbol of freedom from her environment. She allies herself with a group of "trendy" and popular girls in an effort to disassociate from her lower class, dysfunctional family. Her motivation to improve herself and her circumstances become the main focus of the film. She believes that if she is accepted by these girls as a peer, her life will improve and she would have "made it". Her desire for a wedding represents both an escape from her present life and also the opportunity of peer acceptance and social standing within the community.
Through the use of symbols it becomes obvious that Muriel is more concerned with constructing a wedding than she is with the traditional convention of marriage. We see ...

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