WARNING: SPOILERS ahead for His Three Daughters.
Carrie Coon’s character in the Netflix family drama film His Three Daughters fights very hard to get her father’s DNR signed. The outstanding albeit small cast of His Three Daughters is led by Coon’s domineering Katie, Elizabeth Olsen’s eccentric Christina, and Natasha Lyonne’s rugged and down-to-earth Rachel. Katie is the oldest and most demanding sister of Christina and Rachel in His Three Daughters. She holds herself and her sisters to high expectations, which has driven some wedges in between their dynamic over the years. Her animosity toward Rachel is particularly notable and tense throughout the Azazel Jacobs (The Lovers, French Exit) film.
His Three Daughters was released on Netflix on September 20, 2024 following a two-week theatrical run in select theaters. The film originally premiered over a year ago at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 9, 2023. The film debuted with a near-perfect 99% Rotten Tomatoes score upon its Netflix release, a score that has slightly dropped to a very impressive 97%. As of the time of writing, His Three Daughters is the fourth most popular movie on Netflix at the end of its opening weekend on the streaming platform. By the end of His Three Daughters, Katie learns to let go of her need to control the situation after successfully getting Vincent’s DNR form signed.
His Three Daughters
is now streaming exclusively on Netflix.
Katie Believes Her Dad Wanted To Sign A DNR Form But Didn’t Because Of Rachel
Katie views it as just another example of Rachel being a screw up
Katie is mad at Rachel because if she had handled this earlier, it wouldn’t have been a big deal but now it has become a serious and challenging matter.
Katie’s main objective throughout the first act of His Three Daughters is getting Vincent’s DNR, or Do Not Resuscitate, order form signed by a doctor. In order for this to happen, she has to find a doctor who will come to Vincent’s New York apartment and witness Vincent signing the form. This has become increasingly hard to do as Vincent’s health declines and he is hardly able to maintain consciousness or say more than a few mumbled words on a daily basis. Katie, whose determination is one of her best attributes, finds a doctor who is willing to come to the apartment and ultimately gets the DNR order signed, which she says is what Vincent had wanted.
Katie uses the DNR form as a way to point out Rachel’s negligence. She blames Rachel countless times for making the process of Vincent signing the DNR form harder now that her dad is in hospice care when Rachel has plenty of time to do it before things get worse. Katie is mad at Rachel because if she had handled this earlier, it wouldn’t have been a big deal but now it has become a serious and challenging matter. Instead of wondering why Vincent hadn’t taken his own initiative to sign the DNR form beforehand, Katie piles on Rachel and relentlessly uses it against her to point out her immaturity and lack of responsibility.
Katie Is Afraid Of Her Father Getting Injured While Trying To Be Resuscitated
Katie’s reasons for the DNR are justified but her harsh treatment of Rachel is not
Katie’s inability to be gentle with Rachel about the form or try to understand why Rachel may have not gotten it signed shows her lack of sensitivity towards her sister.
Katie has valid reasons for making the DNR order a big deal, which the hospice care worker Angel also agrees with. She brings up a story of someone she knew who had several ribs broken when paramedics resuscitated her after she had basically already passed. That person was also comatose and brain-dead for the last three weeks of her life, a fate that Katie is trying to avoid at all costs for Vincent. Katie strives for a guarantee that Vincent won’t have to bear the same treatment and the DNR form is the only way to prevent paramedics from trying to resuscitate Vincent after he dies naturally.
Angel, who Katie nicknamed “Angel of Death”, gently suggests that there are ways around not having a DNR order signed even though he claims to be a firm supporter of it. He implies that Katie could hypothetically not call paramedics right after Vincent’s heart stops beating and also implies that Katie could give a mild overdose of Vincent’s pain medication that would kill him. Katie appreciates this insight but is still adamant about doing things the right way, which is completely reasonable for her to do. Her inability, however, to be gentle with Rachel about the form or try to understand why Rachel may have not gotten it signed shows her lack of sensitivity towards her sister.
Was Vincent Conscious When Katie Finally Got Him To Sign The DNR Form?
The doctor Katie found said all Vincent needed was a pulse to sign the form
There is not a scene in His Three Daughters that depicts Vincent signing the DNR form, so the audience, like Rachel, is forced to take Katie’s word for it. It’s possible that Vincent was improbably awake and alert when the doctor arrived with the form, even though Katie and Christina had both expressed that he had hardly been conscious in the days leading up to it. Given that Katie was more focused on completing her objective than maintaining ethical boundaries, it’s not out of the question that she helped her father sign the form. She said later on the phone that all Vincent needed was a pulse. The doctor was in and out in 10 minutes and paid $550, unlikely to care much about ethics with an impending paycheck in His Three Daughters.