Lantana

Class:

As the story unfolds we learn more about the characters and their lives and relationships. We see the relationship between Paula and Jane is already tenuous as Paula does not trust her around Nik and this wariness is well founded when Jane reports Nik throwing the shoe into the bush to the police thereby destroying her relationship with Paula. However the main destruction of their friendship is when Jane tidies their house while they are at the police station and Paula screams across the fence at her' " you've got no right, no fucking right." The audience is given insight into the marriage of Paula and Nik as although they are the ones facing the problem of living on a single income and the investigation into Nik they are the only couple with trust between them which all the other couples lack. This is shown most clearly when Paula goes to see Nik at the police station. Nik is in all black and is unshaven compared to Paula in all white, the colours denoting good and evil. At first she is unsure about going to him but when he tells her that he didn't touch Valerie she goes to him and holds him. This unconditional acceptance makes Leon uncomfortable as it lacking from his marriage and he leaves the room.

Trust:

The contrast between Nik and Leon is shown in this scene, as Sonja already doubts Leon fidelity yet Paula trusts Nik implicitly just on words. The contrast is shown again when John asks Leon what holds his marriage together, "loyalty...love...maybe habit, sometimes passion... our kids." There is no mention of trust as Leon has already lied to John about being faithful after which John confesses that he was unfaithful as his marriage was held together by grief. Bovell's emphasis on Leon's failings either endears him to the audience or makes him less of a 'hero' it is left up to the audience to interpret.