I am a happy, talented, handsome, 30 something who is still single. Some may consider this a tribute to the individuality and preservation of strong modern women. My mother thinks this is a failure of apocalyptic proportions. And me? I consider the direction to be my undying love in cinematography. I waited patiently for my Humphred Bogart, my John Cusack my Cary Elwes. Is it any wonder that Nelson from the Ration class couldn’t impress me with dinner at TGIF? I’m looking forward to the explosion of boxes in the twilight outside my window by Peter Gabriel! I am looking forward to the long slow wet bases of three days. I expect my life to set a beautifully sad tone, and I expect to be able to weep appropriately when my knight makes a gesture of eternal devotion.
So…. with a box of Kleenex and a bag of popcorn, a smartphone and I watch a lot of movies Over the weekend . This list of bush movies describes the top ten offenders in my complete and utter failure to connect with male species for any significant amount of time.
#1 – ‘What to say’ is one of the typical movies of the 80’s teenagers who don’t know what to do with themselves trying to do everything before graduation from high school She is too good for him, and better than he thinks he is. John Cusack, after spilling his heart to Jon Skye, is devastated by an unforgivable response. “I gave him my heart and he gave me a pen.” Pen!! Can you imagine? Until that very wisdom. How many stupid things did you say in high school? More than I can list, nor would I like to remember. What I wanted to sound sweet and understanding came out as shallow and dogged. We’re emotional morons in high school, which is totally ironic considering we’re so full of hormones. Cusack’s line in this movie sums up all those years for me in one beautifully pressed sentence. A soap opera that many of us didn’t think we’d survive. Unforgivable social offenses are committed alone. And let us make memories with broken hearts, so that we may know.
#2. It is a fairy tale with all the necessary pieces that Disney taught me to expect in these formulas. Good guys, bad guys, sword fighting and being swept off your feet. Oh yeah… and true love. When Cary Elwes’ character Robin Wright falls in love (it wasn’t Penna though), he says he loves her, everyone says “As you wish”. Now, although the most obvious attraction any woman should hear is this word, it means a little more. I will do whatever you want. Whatever is needed, I will provide. Whatever you ask for, I will give it. It means that he is making his living, that the firm is intact. For he will not be fulfilled unless he knows that he is happy. And really what is love, isn’t it? Love is when doing something for someone else feels better than doing it for yourself. Seeing them smile makes them happy, but Love is when you know that you are the one who made them smile and leaves you feeling complete. Love is free. And it all depends on how you can make them whole.
#3 – ‘Casablanca’ is a classic, no one will argue that; a love story that transcends black and white. But Humphrey Bogart’s character in this movie is the ultimate romantic hero. He left and never stopped loving. So he goes to the ends of the Earth, to hide from all pain, to put himself in a new life where he no longer has to remember or hurt. How many times have you done it? to escape Covering the disturbances with you. Drink your hair. We are soft creatures – humans. Our bones heal, bruises fade, scars disappear. But inside we are so very fragile. And here, this man, his feelings are so fragile. “In all the articles, in all the towns, in the whole world, he walks in mine.” He says this and you just know, he broke his heart into pieces to put it back together. When he saw this, he made it happen again. It’s tragically sad… and yet… it caused such an obsession in a man to be blessed with excitement. To see someone after all the memories, to let a little time slip away, and to have that feeling well in you, as if you had never left. That’s romance, romance in the wildest of ways. Is it better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?
#4 – ‘The Durham Bulls’ is a movie about baseball. But the film is also about so much more. Kevin Costner’s character is in the twilight of his career and now he’s in charge of his next big show, which only reminds him of how close he is to the end of the line. You thought you were going to be the little baseball star that all the girls were after. Do you think that a guy will have both patience and looks in one woman? Errors and doors. She is stubborn, obstinate, and docile. He knows without question what he wants. To run into someone, anyone really, who takes away that kind of conviction, takes away the spirit. His monologue in the movie about what he believes seems to run all over the place – the soul, and the gifts of Astroturf and Christmas. But then he talks about kisses, and you just want to melt. “…and I believe in a long, slow, deep, soft, wet three-day base.” He says this, and you know that he believes this, and you know that he did this. For women, the physical part of love is so inextricably involved in the emotional part of it and this sentence brings the two together in their highest form.
#5 – ‘Ladyhawke’ is another fairy tale, a fantastical story about love ripped apart by envy. History is as old as time and has been repeated so many times in so many ways. The genius of Matthew Broderick stumbles into the middle of our story by chance. unknowingly aware, he is ours. The lovers in the story are cursed to never be together. By day, Michelle Pfeiffer is a hawk, and by night Rutger Hauer is a wolf. They are together, but not. It is both wonderful and beautiful. And poor Matthew Broderick is so confused as we are through the whole thing. When he runs into Michael Pfeiffer, who was just a bird before time, he asks, “Are you flesh or are you spirit?” To which the answer is cold – “I am saddened.” Oh my. What can you say love that cannot love? It is painful because he cannot leave, or give up hope, or simply die. It is painful that he works every day thinking that these may be the last hours he spends away from him. It hurts because he knows that they are always so close to each other… and yet it is not close enough. The next of kin was tortured. It’s just a pain in the ass. I cry every time I see this scene.
#6 – ‘Shakespeare In Love’ is the Best Movie Oscar winner and I’ll tell you why. First, it’s fantastic. Second, William Shakespeare’s plays are based on. He is immortal and understood romance. Joseph Fiennes and Gwyneth Paltrow’s behavior is torn by their social status and family expectations. Shakespeare has been told so many times, you think it’s going to be old…..and yet every time you see it or read it or hear it, it sounds new again. In the end, because romance is not always a happy outcome, Fiennes and Paltrow must say goodbye to each other, and he prays – “Write me well.” And his answer? “You will never be my age, nor fail, nor die.” If someone told me, I don’t care who it was, I would take him right away. It is a beautiful line, even in the most obvious tragedy. He will never see her again, and yet he intends to make her immortal. Sometimes you can save yourself by taking a memory, in a container with guns, getting up alone in the morning. It is not meant to inflict such a painful loss. We have to find a way to reduce it, or reduce it. and his way? It is surprising that our romantic poet will write it in infamy.
#7 – ‘As Good As It Gets’ felt like the story of my life when I first saw it. All good people are either homosexual or insane. And by ‘good’ they mean those who watch over me at night. Jack Nicholson shines in this movie alongside the wonderfully vulnerable Helen Hunt. The way she plays, she has this paper thin costume of bravery, the mother and son she’s forced to wear, and yet you can almost feel someone screaming there. To hold it. That everything is ok. It’s an obvious choice from this movie’s best romantic line, but it’s not the one I’d choose. My wanderer is when Nicholson shows up in the apartment Hunting and opens the door and looks at him and says “Come in, try not to He will destroy everything through you.” It’s funny and beautifully romantic at the same time. She accepted him, for all his antagonisms and needs, she accepted him for who he is. He doesn’t want to change it. by being you You are right. It’s sweet and sounds like my parents and I want to grow old like that.
#8 – ‘King Kong’ is probably not the movie you expected on the list of great romantic quotes but hear me out. The theme is great and universal – all he wants is a woman, this beautiful beautiful woman. And it will do something to have that face of a cruel world of sad enemies, misunderstood and hidden. He will die for her. It is the Phantom of the Work; that is Cyranno de Bergerac. You feel sorry for the monster when you are stressed by the Army that throws him out, but the line that lingers – “Oh no, it wasn’t the airplanes. Beauty killed the beast” just reminds you that Love comes this way. so many forms, so many and different. When we are young, we look for physically attractive, beautiful people. And when we grow up and understand beauty a little better, we expect something else. We look for that devotion, the absolute devotion, which leaves one feeling empty when it is gone. I’m not trying to compare people or companions to dogs, because that’s what it sounds like….. I’m trying to explain how pure this love is in King Kong. If you still don’t believe me, or think this argument is crazy, ask yourselves – why do you feel sorry for the beast at the end?
#9 – ‘Beyond Borders’ is an awesome movie. It depicts the efforts of humanity in the most fragile parts of the world. The horror shows not in an uncertain place. Children dying, people dying of disease, rich nations that don’t seem to care, and everyday people like you and me who look the other way because there is nothing we can do to make a difference. It’s a very difficult movie to watch, and I probably never would have bothered if it wasn’t for Clive Owen. His character is an activist, a life-long activist. And all of you are likely to have someone like that, someone who is so consumed with their cause that they do nothing else in life. Angelina Jolie is a love interest and fights with this cause to become a part of her life. He makes his own battle, his own. A ferocious and inexorable impulse and passion to save all of Humanity attracts, to fight, which cannot be overcome. He tries to drive her away, and she fights back. He tries to disappear and finds out. He tries to convince her that she deserves better and says “There is more to this life, a purpose for all of us, a place to meet. You were my home. I knew from the moment I met you, that night. Many years ago.” Love at first sight has never been so brilliantly portrayed. Because movie makers not in one scene or look or in one line. But they showed us after the whole movie that she loved him from the beginning. You were my home. And how handsome is he? Country is where you are, where you know you belong. And finding someone who you know is you must be the most comforting feeling in the world.
#10 And of course it’s sweet and tragic and he dies and saves her and it’s amazing, but I’m telling you why this movie will make you cry. Patrick Swayze is every man you will ever meet. There is no movement, no debonair, no knight here sweeps you underfoot. He met every man who did not want to talk about his heart. Everyone I know, including my father, would rather talk about politics or sports. Here’s why I’m ending the list with this ramble – even that Every Man Can Be Romantic is just for listening. Demi Moore says I love you, and she says… “Ditto.” And he says that He says I love you. You are the world, my future, my soul. It means that I will die with you, that I will come back to save you. Because he cannot say, he does not want, he does not want. Some men cannot, and never want to, use women when expressing their thoughts. And why do we think it is misleading at all…. be damned. My dad is very uncomfortable with all this nonsense, because we love him so much, but when he mumbles something….like ‘Ditto’….I know what he’s trying to say. And this has always been enough for me.
So in the end you can see why I’m still here with the cat on Friday night, waiting for my story, for my Romeo. It’s time to venture into reality, with no slow pans through wet notes or soft sounds. Maybe it’s time to find my romantic and make a few quotes of mine.
