Things Romantic Movies Get Wrong About Relationships

Page 1 of 4 [ 60 posts ]  Go to page 1, 2, 3, 4  Next

atruelove88
Emu Egg
Emu Egg

Joined: 14 Sep 2017
Age: 37
Gender: Female
Posts: 2
Location: cebu city

28 Sep 2017, 6:02 pm

Pop media does not always portray realistic relationships. Most romantic stories are written to make viewers empathetic, but are often just made-up fantasies. Sure, you might see a boy chasing after a girl in a subway, like they do in movies; but unlike in movies, they don’t usually end with a kiss. In real life, it ends with a restraining order against the guy. That’s just one thing that romantic movies get wrong about relationships.

Another example is how there always has to be a third party, a rival for true love, a love triangle. Romantic movies introduce such characters in order to add tension and conflict (which I understand are needed to tell an engaging story), but most real-life relationships are already beset by common problems such as debt, bills, and whose turn is it to take out the trash. Not all real-life relationships have a love triangle, and if some do, then it’s usually resolved during the courtship stage.

Speaking of debt and bills, why is it that there’s always a difference in status between the couple? Like how the guy is a rich, pampered descendant of a Welsh royal—King Arthur himself even—and the girl is just from down the corner of Edison, New Jersey, or vice versa. It just adds more fantasy to the story.

But despite all of my gripes about what romantic movies get wrong about relationships, I still enjoy watching them. I have fun rooting for the guy chasing for the girl in the subway. I celebrate when the guy triumphs over the rival and wins the girl’s hand. I swoon when the man of lordly caliber sweeps the pauper girl off of her feet and marries her despite the gap in their station. I enjoy romantic movies for what they are—made-up fantasies.

Do you have any suggestions on good romantic movies that portray relationships realistically? Let me know.



wanderlust77
Snowy Owl
Snowy Owl

User avatar

Joined: 27 Aug 2017
Age: 26
Gender: Female
Posts: 140
Location: Ireland

28 Sep 2017, 7:37 pm

One Day with Anne Hattaway



Closet Genious
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 12 Jan 2017
Age: 29
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,225
Location: Sweden

28 Sep 2017, 9:53 pm

Romantic movies are about as accurate about romance, as marvel movies are about fighting.



Sweetleaf
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 6 Jan 2011
Age: 34
Gender: Female
Posts: 34,440
Location: Somewhere in Colorado

28 Sep 2017, 9:56 pm

Well it wouldn't really be a movie if it was just an exact reflection of real life, that would be a documentary.


_________________
We won't go back.


B19
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 11 Jan 2013
Gender: Female
Posts: 9,993
Location: New Zealand

29 Sep 2017, 1:53 am

In the mythical world of romantic movies, things always work out in the end, no matter what. Life is not like that.

The movie "Pretty Woman", while entertaining, was particularly absurd in terms of the real world..



magz
Forum Moderator
Forum Moderator

User avatar

Joined: 1 Jun 2017
Age: 39
Gender: Female
Posts: 16,283
Location: Poland

29 Sep 2017, 1:59 am

Sweetleaf wrote:
Well it wouldn't really be a movie if it was just an exact reflection of real life, that would be a documentary.

Even documentaries are composed to make some narrative and tend to focus on unusual situations.


_________________
Let's not confuse being normal with being mentally healthy.

<not moderating PPR stuff concerning East Europe>


Boxman108
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 2 Jan 2012
Age: 32
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,832
Location: NH

29 Sep 2017, 8:03 am

This one handles it relatively well.


_________________
About suffering they were never wrong,
The Old Masters: how well they understood
Its human position; how it takes place
While someone else is eating or opening a window or
just walking dully along...


The_Face_of_Boo
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 16 Jun 2010
Age: 41
Gender: Non-binary
Posts: 32,872
Location: Beirut, Lebanon.

29 Sep 2017, 8:15 am

atruelove88 wrote:
Speaking of debt and bills, why is it that there’s always a difference in status between the couple? Like how the guy is a rich, pampered descendant of a Welsh royal—King Arthur himself even—and the girl is just from down the corner of Edison, New Jersey, or vice versa. It just adds more fantasy to the story.



In order to "arouse" the majority of the target audience: the middle-class women.


You yourself just said it " It just adds more fantasy to the story" ....so the rich man is a romantic/sexual fantasy in one way or another, and this why the formula works, It is the "Porn for women"

And it's cross-cultural, in about 90% of American, Mexican, Brazilian and even Turkish and Arab soap operas the man is rich while the woman isn't much so.



BirdInFlight
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 8 Jun 2013
Age: 62
Gender: Female
Posts: 4,501
Location: If not here, then where?

29 Sep 2017, 9:06 am

One thing I really hate, but which is used in a high percentage of romantic movies, is when the plot revolves around the couple starting out hating each other and being actually incompatible. But always ends with them believing they are perfectly right for each other and all the issues have just melted away.

In real life, if there is someone you know with whom you are having very clear tension, differences with, or even mutual hostility, that is NOT likely to be a person with whom a relationship will get any better than that. In fact, it's a red flag that this is the wrong person to get involved with.

These films show people "falling in love" with people who have treated them badly, have been incredibly rude to them, or whom they despise for legitimate reasons in the beginning.

I blame Jane Austen for starting that BS fantasy by way of Mr Darcy. And lets not forget Emily Bronte's Heathcliff!!

Women STILL swoon over Heathcliff in film and book, yet he's a despicable, despicable person.



magz
Forum Moderator
Forum Moderator

User avatar

Joined: 1 Jun 2017
Age: 39
Gender: Female
Posts: 16,283
Location: Poland

29 Sep 2017, 9:36 am

BirdInFlight wrote:
One thing I really hate, but which is used in a high percentage of romantic movies, is when the plot revolves around the couple starting out hating each other and being actually incompatible. But always ends with them believing they are perfectly right for each other and all the issues have just melted away.

In real life, if there is someone you know with whom you are having very clear tension, differences with, or even mutual hostility, that is NOT likely to be a person with whom a relationship will get any better than that. In fact, it's a red flag that this is the wrong person to get involved with.

These films show people "falling in love" with people who have treated them badly, have been incredibly rude to them, or whom they despise for legitimate reasons in the beginning.

I blame Jane Austen for starting that BS fantasy by way of Mr Darcy. And lets not forget Emily Bronte's Heathcliff!!

Women STILL swoon over Heathcliff in film and book, yet he's a despicable, despicable person.

Well, maybe Catherine would be happy with him - she wasn't an angel, too. But she chose the money.

I really hate this trope, where a guy is bad but the woman loves him and by the power of her love he changes. Quite common in books.
Learned the hard way it doesn't work that way. It's been over for years but the harm is still not fully healed.


_________________
Let's not confuse being normal with being mentally healthy.

<not moderating PPR stuff concerning East Europe>


Closet Genious
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 12 Jan 2017
Age: 29
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,225
Location: Sweden

29 Sep 2017, 9:55 am

magz wrote:
BirdInFlight wrote:
One thing I really hate, but which is used in a high percentage of romantic movies, is when the plot revolves around the couple starting out hating each other and being actually incompatible. But always ends with them believing they are perfectly right for each other and all the issues have just melted away.

In real life, if there is someone you know with whom you are having very clear tension, differences with, or even mutual hostility, that is NOT likely to be a person with whom a relationship will get any better than that. In fact, it's a red flag that this is the wrong person to get involved with.

These films show people "falling in love" with people who have treated them badly, have been incredibly rude to them, or whom they despise for legitimate reasons in the beginning.

I blame Jane Austen for starting that BS fantasy by way of Mr Darcy. And lets not forget Emily Bronte's Heathcliff!!

Women STILL swoon over Heathcliff in film and book, yet he's a despicable, despicable person.

Well, maybe Catherine would be happy with him - she wasn't an angel, too. But she chose the money.

I really hate this trope, where a guy is bad but the woman loves him and by the power of her love he changes. Quite common in books.
Learned the hard way it doesn't work that way. It's been over for years but the harm is still not fully healed.


I hate it too, I wish women would start appreciating guys who want to treat them well, but reality is that alot(I want to say most)women love being treated like crap. They love it.

Every woman I've been with in my life, whether short term or long term, has treated me better the less I cared about them. Ignoring them, giving backhanded compliments ect. It's annoying but it works, and in the end I do what works, even though I have an urge to be the good guy. Women are f*****g hilarious.



BirdInFlight
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 8 Jun 2013
Age: 62
Gender: Female
Posts: 4,501
Location: If not here, then where?

29 Sep 2017, 10:05 am

I agree Catherine was no angel either.


To Closet Genious -- many women sadly do buy into this bad guy thing, yes, in the "movie"-like belief that they can change them or that love heals everything, and no, it doesn't.

But please know, there are plenty of women who do not have that unhealthy idea, and who do look for and marry the good guy who treats them well.

It's just that these women are all tucked away hidden in good marriages, being busy with their drama free lives!

You or I tend not to even hear of them -- they don't show up in news articles about abuse, and they aren't in clubs and bars either.

But there are legions of them out there. It's just that they are already "gone" very quickly from the dating scene. The people remaining just give a false impression of the numbers of bad-guy seekers.

It's often also a function of getting older and having some bad experiences, that an older female has learned to lose their interest in men who treat them badly, and instead learn that they want a better person to have a relationship with.

Obviously this varies from individual to individual, and some people will never learn. But some people do find it comes with age that they have left behind destructive partners as their choice, and will no longer tolerate someone who tries sh***y treatment.

Trouble is, by the time someone learns that, they're too old to find anyone, lol.



Closet Genious
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 12 Jan 2017
Age: 29
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,225
Location: Sweden

29 Sep 2017, 10:13 am

BirdInFlight wrote:
I agree Catherine was no angel either.


To Closet Genious -- many women sadly do buy into this bad guy thing, yes, in the "movie"-like belief that they can change them or that love heals everything, and no, it doesn't.

But please know, there are plenty of women who do not have that unhealthy idea, and who do look for and marry the good guy who treats them well.

It's just that these women are all tucked away hidden in good marriages, being busy with their drama free lives!

You or I tend not to even hear of them -- they don't show up in news articles about abuse, and they aren't in clubs and bars either.

But there are legions of them out there. It's just that they are already "gone" very quickly from the dating scene. The people remaining just give a false impression of the numbers of bad-guy seekers.

It's often also a function of getting older and having some bad experiences, that an older female has learned to lose their interest in men who treat them badly, and instead learn that they want a better person to have a relationship with.

Obviously this varies from individual to individual, and some people will never learn. But some people do find it comes with age that they have left behind destructive partners as their choice, and will no longer tolerate someone who tries sh***y treatment.

Trouble is, by the time someone learns that, they're too old to find anyone, lol.


This will sound harsh, but a woman who couldn't figure that out to begin with, is not a woman I would want a relationship with.



BirdInFlight
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 8 Jun 2013
Age: 62
Gender: Female
Posts: 4,501
Location: If not here, then where?

29 Sep 2017, 10:25 am

That is harsh and unjust actually. Being YOUNG is all about making mistakes and having to learn things.

You will be discarding and disqualifying almost everyone in your life if your criteria is that you only want to know people who have never made mistakes, been unhealthy in what they have accepted, or chosen wrongly at times.

Because almost everyone on the planet does some of those things and then the greatest thing is when they do in fact start to learn better lessons from those experiences.

That goes for not just dating but everything in life. Being younger and doing stupid things then getting older and realizing those were stupid things is HUMAN and everyone does it.

Wow.

First a person gets criticized for making bad choices and not being wise from the get-go.

Then the person who IS wise enough to have actually LEARNED and grown and changed, is not good enough for you.

Sorry but I have NOTHING else to say to you.

It's an AMAZING thing for a person to GROW beyond former poor choices. That is an amazing person to know.

And by the way, some "genius" you are -- you are spelling it wrong in your name.



Closet Genious
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 12 Jan 2017
Age: 29
Gender: Male
Posts: 1,225
Location: Sweden

29 Sep 2017, 10:41 am

BirdInFlight wrote:
That is harsh and unjust actually. Being YOUNG is all about making mistakes and having to learn things.

You will be discarding and disqualifying almost everyone in your life if your criteria is that you only want to know people who have never made mistakes, been unhealthy in what they have accepted, or chosen wrongly at times.

Because almost everyone on the planet does some of those things and then the greatest thing is when they do in fact start to learn better lessons from those experiences.

That goes for not just dating but everything in life. Being younger and doing stupid things then getting older and realizing those were stupid things is HUMAN and everyone does it.

Wow.

First a person gets criticized for making bad choices and not being wise from the get-go.

Then the person who IS wise enough to have actually LEARNED and grown and changed, is not good enough for you.

Sorry but I have NOTHING else to say to you.

It's an AMAZING thing for a person to GROW beyond former poor choices. That is an amazing person to know.


It's even more amazing to not make poor choices in the first place. There's a difference between making mistakes, and being completely thoughtless.

A woman who wasted her best years in terms of beauty and fertility on dating criminals and bikers, and then suddenly wants a good guy when she is old, is like a rich man who wasted all his money on hookers, but then suddenly wants a to settle down with a good girl once he is poor. I'm sorry to say, but it doesn't work like that, these people do not even deserve it in my opinion. The choices we make have consequences, if you want the best there are some sacrifices to be made.



The_Face_of_Boo
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 16 Jun 2010
Age: 41
Gender: Non-binary
Posts: 32,872
Location: Beirut, Lebanon.

29 Sep 2017, 10:43 am

Pfff come on... it's time for you to evolve to more reasonable creatures.

Ladies... evolve! We are no longer cavemen. :lol:

Youth is not an excuse for such stupidity honestly; Closet is young but he isn't that stupid when it comes to relationships; why most girls of his age can't be the same?