the thing about obsession is that I already knew men were capable of great violence, even the ones that you think you can trust, the ones you feel closest to, the ones you think are good people. at the end of the day, oftentimes, their desire to possess you overrides everything else. to me, the saddest takeaway of the movie is that nikki truly had nobody. all her friends saw her acting oddly, they all saw her break down at the party and try to smash her head in with a bottle. they all saw bear taking advantage of her mental state. and still nobody else stepped in. maybe they didn't think anything was wrong, I don't know, but more likely, it was just easier for them to look the other way and lie to themselves that everything would be okay. maybe tell themselves that she'd turn them away if they did try to help. because to try to help would be to experience discomfort and nobody ever wants to put themselves through that. it made me think of real life and how women in abusive relationships become so isolated - partially due to fault of their abuser, of course, but also because most people have the mindset of "not my business" and "too much trouble". which sure, applies sometimes, but when its your closest friend it IS your business. they could see she was going through something, but its always easier to talk about them behind their back and pretend you've shown concern, that you're a good person for "caring", rather than actually make an effort to help - which most times is ugly and difficult but is the right thing to do.
sadly, sarah and ian's actions rang very true to real life. ian said a few perfunctory words to bear about 'how its wrong' which made no difference at all, but he could pat himself on the back and sleep easy at night after doing so. sarah ended up making it about herself, telling bear "that he didn't deserve nikki putting her troubles on him" (paraphrasing) and suggested that he'd be better off with her, although she knew that nikki didn't have feelings for bear and a blind person could see that something fishy was going on. yet she took the easy way out and pretended she was caring about bear while being unbearably selfish.
maybe they could have helped her - maybe she would have snapped out for a moment and they would have realized what was wrong, maybe they could have forced bear to tell them, maybe they wouldn't have been able to change anything. but it is so sad that they didn't even try.
worse, we know nikki is someone who's there for other people, as evidenced by the dialogue early-on where bear tells Ian she was the one who showed up and took care of him when his grandmother died. yet, when it came down to it, nobody showed up for her. she was failed in every way and this frightens me, because I wonder how many of my friends will look past their own discomfort to come help me if I was ever in a similar situation.
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