“T’HE things life has done to us we cannot excuse or explain.” This rationalization uttered by Mary Tyrone is the leitmotif of Long Day’s Journey into Night, a faithful cinematic adaptation of the Eugene O’Neill play. Although the four Tyrones occupy most of 171 minutes trying to excuse and explain the things they have done to each other, their joint effort to transfer the blame for their misery to “life” serves only to intensify their problems of guilt.
O’Neill telescopes the Tyrones’ strife-ridden family life (a case history of his own family) into the conventional dramatic unity of a single day. Under the influence of morphine or whiskey, the Tyrones dissect the past, accuse, confess, and excuse. The waning of the day symbolizes the vanishing family hope of happiness, and the night that falls on the Tyrones will not be dispelled by a rising sun.
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