Regarding Henry Analysis

Regarding Henry

The stipulations regarding one’s natural state and their reactions in the face of adversity resonates throughout the famous film Regarding Henry. In this classic, the main protagonist, Henry, is faced with the trauma of a gunshot wound to the head that rewinds him to his pre-learned experiences, like a child just starting to figure out the world once again. Because of this gunshot wound, Henry is transformed from his egocentric, cruel, business-man self revolving around his Id, which is the state of mind where he pursues everything he deems necessary for himself, to this kind, caring superego that exists only because of the traumatic event. Every learned experience Henry has ever endured is stripped away, and he starts his
journey as a new man regressed back to the age where morality is beginning to instill. The natural state of Henry is shown to be is his superego, stripped of all behaviors his Id was conditioned to become.
One’s Id is the state where regards for any others’ personal state is completely diminished.
Every action is taken into account on how it will affect the individual’s best interests, and this perfectly described Henry previous to the gunshot wound. He exhibited the qualities of a money obsessed lawyer, who through various unlawful cases, awarded himself money for the lap of luxury. Materials were the only thing close in Henry’s mind, and this is mostly seen after he was shot and his daughter explains how she liked his natural state of the superego better. Henry finds that he was lying in a major case that he previously cared to cover up and disregarded the victims of the case entirely. He also discovers his affair with one of his coworkers, in which he had disregarded all vows to his marriage only worrying about his benefit. One specific example of Henry’s Id would be the way in which he yelled at Rachel for a minute reason that could have been easily overlooked. Also the scene right before he was shot where despite being shot, he still only worried about getting his cigarettes, a pride issue. His Id took over his entire mindset towards not only his family and environment, but his morality and perspective on the
world.
The superego state of mind involves one’s humanity towards others and how they take into account their feelings and opinions for other people.
Henry’s superego becomes more prevalent after the shot was taken to the front of his brain. He suddenly becomes interested in the validity of his previous cases in which he wronged people. He also becomes concerned for others such as his daughter and his wife, and the desire to bond his family for good instills as his main priority. Henry’s kindness shows in the way he bonds with Buddy the dog and Bradley, and how he begins to look upon old colleagues with disrespect, knowing their true nature. A specific example would be when Henry quit his job for the simple reason he hated it and what it was doing to his family. Another would be the public display of affection he took part in with Sara, something he would not have done before, because he knew it would make her happy. Because of the gunshot, Henry’s superego presented itself much
more.
A certain scene portrays Rachel speaking to Henry post gunshot wound about how his father taught strict principles to Henry of self discipline to become successful for himself. This is just one example of how Henry’s learned experiences completely transformed his Id to conceal his true superego. Due to the fact that Henry had to restart humanity in his simplest form and began with a strong superego, one can infer that his superego is his true state and was prevalent before his environment began to shape who he was. His superego was also noticed in the scene where he was sitting a top Rachel’s bed apologizing to her after he had yelled at her earlier. A large part of him truly did care for her and Sarah, however, society had begun to shape his morality into becoming self obsessed due to the corruption of his career and the colleagues he centered himself around.
Because he was stripped of everything corrupt and dark in his life due to the trauma of his gunshot, Henry took a regressing journey from his crazed Id to his sensitive superego. Learning everything a new again, Henry developed his persona into an exemplifying superego. This psychological conflict is an intrinsic and pervasive part of human experience according to Freud, the balancing of the Id and the superego is crucial to mental stability. Henry exemplifies Freud’s theory of the mind in that we as humans are transformed to intake more Id or superego to create our ego, which is us. We are all a part of the insane concept of humanity that balances multiple aspects of humanity all shaped by our environment and reaction to the consequences because of it.