Sharp Objects Episode 5
So far Sharp Objects has brought to mind both the plays of Tennessee Williams and the novels of Thomas Harris. Now there’s another possible source of inspiration to add to the list; the behavior of the residents of Wind Gap reminds me of nothing so much as the Stanford Prison experiment. They are unable to escape the pervasive pecking order of drunken disinterest, with many of them happily placing bets on who in their midst might have killed two teenage girls. This popular guessing game focuses on the father of one of the victims and the brother of the other; everyone in town already knows that if you’re going to get murdered, chances are a relative will be to blame. Episode five is a beautifully designed pressure cooker, with so many emotions bubbling away inside the rigid structure of Calhoun Day. By restricting the action to that one day, from morning to evening, the close, oppressive atmosphere can not be escaped – and Camille, understandably, does try to escape early on after a hugely upsetting confrontation with Adora in a dress shop. Amma stopped her from leaving, pointing out that she has to stay, so Camille should too. This appeal to sisterly solidarity worked. Despite a rocky start, and episodes in Camille’s past that makes her wary of that sort of relationship, Camille has started to form a bond with Amma. It’s enough of a motivator to keep Camille close by, particularly as she suspects Amma might be earmarked as the next victim. Of course, it’s Camille who knows where to find her sister. The old hunting cabin that haunts her past and also features in her worst imaginings of the future was the first place she headed to – and there was Amma, not murdered, but scared and confused, and in need of a good night’s sleep. Could Amma’s welfare be enough to build a bridge between Camille and her mother? Finally they’ve found something they have in common. For a moment it seemed possible: Adora invited Camille to have a drink with her, and the two spoke softly together. Hoping for an end to their ongoing war, perhaps, Camille seemed to lean in, to hear Adora better. If Wind Gap is a prison experiment, then Adora is the Chief Warden. She is the center of all attention, perched in her big house, so certain that everyone will accede to her wishes. She sets the tone of the town in many ways; everyone is employed and hardened by her family business, and she waves away bad thoughts and deeds rather than dealing with them. So many people are trapped in her manipulations – even Richard, new to this game, has been brought into play. How long will it take before this atmosphere of cruelty, flourishing under the disguise of tradition, turns him into a sadist too? I fear for Camille, who has so few people to care for, and who truly care for her. She escaped once, but I’m not sure she will again. I started watching Sharp Objects with the concern that Adora was a character straight out of a melodrama, striking an artificial note in an otherwise delicately layered piece. Now I can see that’s unfounded; Patricia Clarkson is producing an amazing layer of depth as we get to know Adora better. Adora’s disguise is the melodrama she creates: the fussing over the cutting of her thumb, or the idea she clings to that her daughters are out to wound her personally. But since this is a series that urges us to look to the past in order to understand the present, it begs the question – what on earth did Adora experience to turn her into this pain-inflicting, self-obsessed nightmare of a parent? Meanwhile, the murderer still roams free in a town that seems to have less interest in catching them than betting on them. Could bad family relationships – the specialty of Wind Gap – be to blame for this, too? I’m almost afraid to find out how twisted this can get, but with three episodes still to go I suspect there’s still a lot of darkness left to uncover in Sharp Objects before anybody gets released from its spell.
