Never Let Me Go

[bcholmes]

In the book version of Never Let Me Go, there's a powerful scene in which the children suddenly realize that Madam (the woman who runs the Gallery) is terrified of them. The book describes the children plotting to catch her off guard by clustering in the hall when she arrives so that she's surrounded by them. The book makes a lot out of the moment when it suddenly creeps the kids out: it was one thing for them to understand, abstractly, that she looks at them the way she might look at a scary spider, but it was another thing entirely to be there, being stared at the way one might stare at a spider.

Here's the odd thing. When I saw Never Let Me Go in the theatre, a stripped-down version of this scene appears: the kids look out the window and see Madam's car coming down the road. Cut to a door opening: Madam enters the building, and then the kids surround her. She looks panicky as all the kids cluster around her. I don't think that the scene completely works.

I've just watched the DVD for a second time and that scene isn't there. Weird.