The Moviegoer

When Binx arrives to his aunt’s house, Mercer, her butler, “a chesty sand-colored Negro with a shaved head and a dignified Adolph Menjou mustache” (22), lets him in and tries to engage Binx in conversation. Binx explains that though Mercer is important to his aunt, Mercer has been stealing “regularly from her by getting kickbacks from the servants and trades people” (23). Binx examines a photograph of his uncles and his father on a mountain that captures a moment they shared after World War I, before his father’s death in 1940. At this time, Binx’s aunt offered to pay for Binx’s education, as his mother had to go back to work as a nurse. Soon after, Aunt Emily marries Uncle Jules, a “widower with child” (27).

When Aunt Emily comes to greet Binx, he prepares himself for “one of her special attacks, attacks which are both playful and partly true” (26), attacks which make Binx feel like a part of the family. Instead, Aunt Emily shows Binx a carton of wine bottles and a large container of tablets containing sodium pentobarbital, all of which have been found in Binx’s cousin Kate’s room. Aunt Emily explains that Kate, who is preparing to marry a man named Walter that Binx knows from college, will be fine, but “as time grows short, she is getting a little nervous” (28). Aunt Emily asks Binx to talk with Kate and to “take her to the Lejiers and watch the parade from the front porch” (29). Soon Sam will arrive, and he, too, will be able to speak with Kate and ease her troubled mind. 

The narrator and protagonist, Binx Bolling, tells his story from the first person, providing the reader with an intimate experience. His storytelling style is personal, open and confessional, as he admits his despair, emotional vulnerability and existential wondering. For example, when Binx elaborates on the search he first mentions in Chapter 1, he explains that “[t]he search is what anyone would undertake if he were not sunk in the everydayness of his own life” (13). By describing the search in this way, Binx is acknowledging that he is losing his sense of himself in his own quotidian routines, and for some reason, this tendency is a dangerous one, one that Binx must fight against to stay stable.

Binx’s family dynamics and interpersonal relationships are complex. He refers to the Lindas, the series of pretty young secretaries he hires and then romances. As well, Binx describes his fascination with movie stars, which turn into imagined relationships of his own making. He feels connected when he goes to the movies, and immerses himself in the stories on the big screen. In these early chapters, the reader also learns about his relationship with his Aunt Emily, his father’s sister, and his cousin, Kate, who is twenty-five and troubled.

In his narration, Binx employs descriptors that recall the violence of war, like the gunmetal of the raincoat belonging to the girl on the bus, which conveys an image like armor, and the verbal attacks by his aunt. These uses of imagery suggest that Binx is always on the defensive, looking for ways in which he is vulnerable to injury or death, physical or otherwise. It seems plausible, as well, that Binx harbors some level of shellshock, or what today would be called PTSD, as he seems to never feel safe and figuratively sees war, or applies its imagery, to civilian life and trappings. 

Binx expresses surprise at finding his uncle at the lunch table, as Uncle Jules has recently suffered a heart attack. Kate and Walter are sitting around the table, and Binx notes that “[i]t is hard to believe anything is wrong” (30). Binx reflects on the credit he receives from Uncle Jules for capitalizing on his ability “to sell a great many of the stocks which Uncle Jules underwrites” (30.) At lunch, Kate’s fiancé, Walter, and Uncle Jules discuss football, and Binx mentions Eddie Lovell, whose sister enjoys swapping husbands with other couples. The conversation moves on to various Carnival krewes, or social clubs, soon to be participating in the upcoming Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans. During this conversation, Walter and Aunt Emily engage in banter that causes a strong reaction in Kate, who is never too far from another breakdown. Kate “utters a clicking sound in her teeth and abruptly leaves the room” (34). Walter follows Kate out of the room, and when he returns, Walter resumes his attempts to convince Binx to ride with him and other members of “the ten wealthiest and most prominent families in New Orleans” (34) in the Krewe of Neptune, which Walter feels is “the best all-around krewe in Carnival” (34).

At this moment, Binx describes to the reader Walter’s character in more detail, remembering Walter from college as “one of those upper-classmen freshmen spot as a model” (35). Binx recalls impressing Walter when Binx was a lowly pledge at Walter’s fraternity, but soon Binx revealed himself to be too dreamy a college boy to earn any honors that would have reflected well on the fraternity: “I had spent the four years propped up on the front porch of the fraternity house, bemused and dreaming” (38).

Walter persists in trying to engage Binx in various social functions, calling Binx a “rare turd” (39) when Binx resists. Binx recalls a time when he “bought a houseboat on Vermilion Bay” (39) with Walter and some other men, an experience he found depressing, leading Binx to realize that he has “always been slightly embarrassed in Walter’s company” (40) and that he would rather spend time with women. Binx explains that “[t]he last time I had friends was eight years ago” (41), when Binx was home from the war, nursing his wound. Nowadays, Binx prefers to “stay home with Mrs. Shexnaydre and run on the TV” (42), not because he enjoys TV, but because “it doesn’t distract me from the wonder” (42).

When Uncle Jules accepts a ride into town with Walter after lunch, Binx looks for Kate in the basement of the house. Kate has changed a shirt and jeans. She appears happy to see Binx, and they talk. Because Kate is in “tolerable good spirits” (44), Binx does not find he needs to “pay too much attention to her” (44). When Binx follows through with his promise to Aunt Emily to ask Kate to watch the parade with him from the front porch of the Lejiers, Kate lights a cigarette and expresses her disgust with her mother’s need to talk about Binx: “I’m sick of talking about you” (44). Binx reflects on Kate’s experience as Jules’s daughter and Emily’s stepdaughter, recognizing that Emily has “fall[en] prey to Kate’s dialectic of hatreds” (46). Binx cares not “which parent she presently likes or dislikes” (46), but he does worry whom she will hate next. Kate refuses to attend the parade with Binx, dismissing him from the basement in an irritated way.

Binx’s sensitive personality is revealed in his mention of “the wonder,” a phenomenon that distracts him from the goings-on of the world around him. Binx’s experiences with the wonder are not necessarily beautiful or exceptional. Often, something completely unexpected and banal can induce the wonder in Binx; because the banal side to life can also inspire emotional and psychological lows in Binx, this contradiction in his character is just one of the first clues into his unreliable narration. For a yet-unknown reason, Binx’s psyche is complicated and reactive, so neither Binx nor the reader can predict how he will respond to certain kinds of situations.

Binx mentions Kate’s “dialectic of hatred” in Chapter 4. A dialectic can be defined as a method of inquiry into a subject that invites different points of view from different individuals. Kate’s growing displeasure with her stepmother (Binx’s aunt, Emily) worries Binx because Aunt Emily often pressures him to look after Kate and to feel responsible for her. If Kate’s hatred of Emily deepens, it could extend to Binx, and if that happens, Kate will truly be alone in her alienated state.

Binx’s narration style is complex. He describes incidents in real time and intersperses these descriptions of daily routines, habits and meals with memories and explanations of meaningful moments. His way of interrupting his own storytelling communicates his dreamy personality, and the reader can imagine him pausing frequently during the day to ponder something that spontaneously comes into his imagination or memory.

Binx returns to the company of his aunt, who is playing the piano, and they resume their “old way of talking, during pauses in the music” (47). Emily asks Binx about his mother, whom Emily dislikes. Binx explains that only luck and circumstance can explain his existence, as his father simply married the nurse who arrived after he applied for one while he was a medical resident: “[t]he door opened and in walked the woman the woman who, as it turned out, would if she were not one-legged or downright ugly, be his wife and my mother” (48). Emily sent Binx to prep school after Binx’s father died, and Binx lived with his aunt during college. Binx’s mother remarried and had six children with her car-dealer husband.

Binx and his aunt discuss a photograph of Binx’s father, Emily’s brother and their two other brothers as a thunderstorm breaks. Emily mentions to Binx her idea that Binx pursue a new career: “My aunt is convinced I have a ‘flair for research’” (51). Binx remembers a summer when he tried to do scientific research, but he “became extraordinarily affected by the summer afternoons in the laboratory” (51). The movement of the sunlight distracted Binx, and “for minutes at a stretch I sat on the floor and watched the motes rise and fall in the sunlight” (52), mesmerized by “the singularities of time and place” (52).

Emily interrupts Binx’s reverie with a clear suggestion about his future: “‘I want you to think about entering medical school this fall’” (53). She describes a summer of relaxation with Walter and the rest of the family that will prepare Binx for the work ahead, and when Binx expresses uncertainty, she asks him a difficult question: “‘What is it you want out of life, son?’” (53). She reminds Binx that he has a fine mind and that his responsibilities as a man include resisting his ennui. Binx begins to explain himself but stops, feeling that “[m]y idea of a search seems absurd” (55). Emily encourages Binx to travel, like his father did, and as she says goodbye to Binx, she tells Binx that he “remind[s] me so much of your father” (56), who “would have been much happier in research” (57). 

Before Binx leaves, Kate “calls from under the steps” (57). She is more cheerful after the storm and a “big drink” (57). She continues to refuse to go to the Lejiers to watch the parade, shrugging her shoulders casually when Binx inquires as to this most recent stressful episode. Kate explains that the accident “gave me my life” (58), because “afterwards everyone said: what a frightful experience she went through and doesn’t she do remarkably well. So then I did very well indeed” (58).

Kate explains to Binx the events that led up to the accident as well as the details of the car wreck; after she had the blood on her blouse cleaned, she “put it on, walked over to the station and caught the Illinois Central for New Orleans” (59). During this bus ride home, she experienced “the happiest moment” (60) of her life. Binx asks her if she means to marry Walter after all, and she responds, “Probably not” (60), refusing one last time to attend to the parade with Binx at the Lejiers.

Binx is at an oyster bar when Kate “comes up so quietly that I think at first it is the Negro boy who wheels the cans of shells into the street” (60). She tells Binx that she needs to tell him the truth about why she won’t go to the Lejiers and why she won’t marry Walter. Binx observes that though she might seem out of sorts, “[s]he is not so bad. I have seen her much worse” (61). They go downtown to watch the parade and see a movie. Binx describes the atmosphere of the parade and the tension in the crowd when “a vanguard of half a dozen extraordinary Negroes dressed in dirty Ku Klux Klan robes, each bearing aloft a brace of pink and white flares” (62) proceeds alongside the floats in the parade. As Walter’s krewe approaches, Binx and Kate leave the parade.

They go to watch a movie that was filmed in the exact New Orleans neighborhood in which the movie theater exists. Afterwards, Kate “refers to a phenomenon of moviegoing which I have called certification” (63). A place becomes certified when it appears in a movie, and a person who sees his neighborhood can feel like “a person who is Somewhere and not Anywhere” (63).

Though Binx observes that Kate may seem better, he knows that in reality, she is playing a part and their “old friendship now itself falls victim to the grisly transmorgrification by which she unfailingly turns everything she touches to horror” (63).