Leave the World Behind recently arrived on Netflix, and it’s the kind of ambiguous psychological thriller that leaves you with lingering questions at the end. One of the biggest mysteries to viewers is the deer that repeatedly appear in the film.
Sam Esmail’s film follows the Sandford family, who decide to “leave the world behind” for an impromptu vacation at an Airbnb in Long Island. What starts as a surprise family vacation takes an odd turn when George “G. H.” Scott (Mahershala Ali) and his daughter Ruth (Myha’la) arrive on their doorstep, claiming to be the owners of the house and requesting to stay the night due to a blackout in the city. While the families are fearful and mistrusting of each other, those feelings must take a backseat when they realize what began as a blackout might actually be a wide scale crisis.
Like the best kinds of psychological thrillers, Leave the World Behind is rarely scary, but it is frequently creepy, creating a feeling of uneasiness. One factor that helps carry this feeling that something is amiss is the recurring presence of deer. Sighting a deer is a pretty common occurrence. However, it’s not just a deer that appears in the film repeatedly, but many deer, traveling in a pack and randomly congregating around the rental home and the Sandford family members. Amanda (Julia Roberts), her daughter Rose (Farrah Mackenzie), and Ruth are all startled by the deer at different moments. They’ll just happen to look up from what they’re doing to realize they’re surrounded by deer.
Viewers will hold their breath, almost expecting the deer to attack because their bold behavior is unusual. The typically skittish animals barely blink an eye, even when Amanda and Ruth start yelling and flailing their arms to try to get them to disperse. In the end, the deer don’t do anything to the characters. They’re just there. So, what do they mean?
The meaning of the deer in Leave the World Behind
There are a few hints about the deer’s presence within Leave the World Behind. In the film, both Rose and Ruth speculate that the deer are trying to tell them something and may even be warning them about what’s happening. There’s also an explanation that viewers might have missed. At one point, while Clay (Ethan Hawke) is driving around town looking for answers, viewers can hear someone on the garbled radio make a statement about how a major “environmental disaster” is impacting the migration patterns of animals. So, it seems the deer are all traveling in a herd due to being affected by the disaster.
However, some of the cast and crew had their own theories on what the deer meant. Myha’la shared her character’s thoughts about the deer being a warning sign, stating that they indicate “what’s going on with the power and the lack of movement of people.” Charlie Evans, who plays Archie, suggests that the deer are meant to remind viewers about their connection with, treatment, and perspective of the natural world. Meanwhile, director Sam Esmail told Tudum it was largely about creating an unlikely threat:
Deer are peaceful creatures. To turn that sweet image into now this sort of ominous, menacing, almost warning — I thought was really interesting. That’s the trick about this movie. We always tried to take the things that we never really considered a threat and then turn it around on them.
It does seem as though the deer are meant to say something about human nature and the natural world. One of the movie’s major themes is how clueless the main protagonists really are. The animals know well before they do that something is wrong, while the humans carry on misunderstanding the situation, making poor choices, and turning on each other. They’re waiting for their malfunctioning technology to tell them what’s wrong while the deer are warning them right outside their window. In this way, the deer are a reminder of the importance of listening to the natural world, as animals are far more attuned to the actual environment than humans are.
(featured image: Netflix)
