Part 3; Ben Affleck and other Mutations of my Mind.

Many many many many people hold this unrealistic, simplistic idea of relationships. Yes you. I'm, talking to you Mr. Jenkins from Surrey. Don't think you can hide or pretend. You should be ashamed! The rest of you are just as bad. Walking around doe-eyed looking for you 'one true love'. Of course we can hardly be blamed for this, we are pumped with expectations of relationships from childhood. Disney is a great proponent of this idea (and has actually managed some exquisite self-parody of late with "Enchanted". Mmmmm Amy Adams...) so are many lite-hearted family films but this light escapism is nothing compared to the crushing damage that is caused by one entire genre of film. The Rom-Com. 99% of Romantic Comedies are BUILT around this idea and go to great lengths to spin it in the audiences mind.

 On one of my insomniac excursions into late-night viewing led me to an **angry sigh** Ben Afflek romp entitled Forces of nature. That would usually be enough for me to go into "DO NOT WANT" mode and get the fuck out of there but i was curios to see where the movie was going. Mr. Afflek plays a man on the way to his wedding who ends up in a plane crash for.... some reason and meets a Girl (Sandra Bollock [hurr hurr]) who is what a hack film producer would call "Quirky". They have some miss-adventures, she gets him into a bit of trouble, there is some nice scenery on a train and they begin to bond. This is the point where i think i know where the movie is going "Well played movie" i thought "You are doing a slightly different angle on the whole thing". The man here has decided to marry the first woman he fell in love with and might just be finding out that there could be hundreds of compatible women out there that he could love or that might even make him happier and he would be being cruel just to settle for someone who his mistook for being 'destined' for and live a life of "What if" just because of the pressure he feels under. 

The second act is.... actually not bad, it's not great but you get the feeling the movie might be going a "We live in the 21st century, we are adults who make our own choices" route. But there keep being moments where it cuts back to his fiance with a weird blue filter and her looking all mopey and said. The film is obviously trying to make us feel sorry for her. The whole thing looks like it is going on in some other movie but if set of alarm bells for me and sure enough the third act rolls and just smacks the audience in the face. "NO" it says "we're not going the route we seemed to be setting up!". Some bullshit about a bagel shop, a kid and a husband come out of nowhere and the film basically takes a great big steamy dump all over its self ending in Affleck's character deciding that re loves again his mopey faience simply by looking into her eyes for a second. That's right folks, this film just decides that Affleck should blindly marry because... the universe wants him to? Oh and there is a hurricane. Well i guess for of a storm since all it does it blow some peoples hats about and knock over a marque and some other hi-larious hijinks **rolls eyes**

Think they look like a good screen couple? Well fuck you! He defied the gods of fate and now we are going to drop a hurricane on him!

Now the storytelling issue of setting up a relationship for an entire film then pushing a "nope" button and having it totally just end in a wet fart of nothing aside the film typifies the message of most rom-coms. Namely the "You will find you true love and everyone else will make you miserable and is not meant to be" school of romance. The issue seems so pronounced in this case because the second act of the film felt like it might actually going a mildly thought provoking route. Afflecks character nearly learned something, the universe almost worked as it does in real life. You feel a spark of would could have been and then feel the utter failure when they snap back into "Traditional Rom-Com" mode. In the end he learns nothing, his journey comes to nothing, he is with the one he is 'supposed' to love rather than the one you saw him develop a relationship with and it nails home what is wrong with the format and much it falls sort of reality. Why does the happen? Well many writers in Hollywood hold the idea of a more 'traditioanl' view of romance. i.e. they have wives and children and want to instill the idea of "one man, one woman, no buts" at every turn simply because they missed the boat on the whole "Unconventional relationships" thing becoming basically the convention.


Romantic 'Comedy' is overwhelmingly a genre squarely aimed at the female demographic. Decades of this type of shit have taken their toll, I'm sure you might unironically here "But is he THE ONE?". No he isn't, because there is no such thing as "THE ONE" (**insert matrix reference here**) and the unrealistic idea that a relationship will just fall into place if it is 'destined' and not having to work at and WANT a relationship with some one if you want it to work is toxic. The person you are with might very well make you happy for the rest of your life if you both decide to work at it, there are legions of women out there who will positively BURN though men because they have an overly idealised image of romance. You know what i take it back, he might well be the one but if you don't get your head out of your arse you certainly won't be. I'm sure this isn't just a female problem, so this goes for anyone; no body is perfect. A relationship is about finding common ground, putting aside differences and working at it. And Working at it. And working at it some more. It is callous to get rid of someone just because you think it "should be perfect of prefect if he/she is THE ONE".

There is a lot more to be said on this subject but I'm leaving it here for now simply for the issue of WALL OF TEXT. But ill be back! And with more tangents! 


In Part 4; Mormon Abstinence Vampire Porn!



Oh and go give someone a hug, everyone needs a hug.