.Gary Dretzka
.Leonard Klady.
.David Poland
.Ray Pride

July 21, 2003

Whatever happened to romance?  Whatever happened to a girl and a boy and some fireworks at the empire State Building? 

Romance has disappeared from the Hollywood menu.  The movies that claim to be love stories are not what they appear.  Even Gigli seems to be little more than a matinee version of Prizzi’s Honor.  Remember honor?  You can take a minute to look it up in the dictionary.  (This is the internet.  You do not need Tivo to keep the page on your screen.)

Prizzi’s Honor was a love story between a guy in his fifties and a woman in her 40s.  Their murderous profession made things complicated.  Love did not conquer all.  The movie still marked a bittersweet moment of movie romance.

The biggest romance in Gigli seems to be off-screen.   Gossip columnists are much more interested in what Columbia Pictures did to Miss Jennifer’s buttocks in the ads than they are about the story of the movie.  I think there was something about Ben wanting his pecs to be made bigger in the ad as well. 

Wedding bells are ringing for the pie pumper in American Wedding.  The trailer shows our young bride-to-be mistaking a marriage proposal for a proposal to perform a public act of oral copulation.  This may be your idea of Breakfast at Tiffany’s.  It is not mine.  Ninety minutes waiting to see what body fluid the best man will drink when he gives the toast is not my idea of romance.

X2: X-Men United had some romantic overtones.  The frisky young woman in the story had a French kiss that was worse than the smell of body odor, cigarettes and old Brie combined.  Then they killed off the only seriously romantic woman. 

Bad Boys II’s idea of romance is a weekend romp between a guy and his best friend’s sister.  That boy loves his big gun most of all.  The undercover lover of 2 Fast 2 Furious is sleeping with the bad boy and flirting with the two closet queens who need to save her life.   Miss Lara Croft would appear to be wearing a strap-on gender-altering appliance in the poster for the movie.  The look in Michelle “girlfight” Rodriguez’ eye as she grasps her rifle screams, “This is my weapon!  This is my gun!  This is for fighting!  This is for fun!”  She works with Colin Farrell and she prefers the gun.  You stop, girl!

In Pirates of the Caribbean, the girl gets the boy.  In Bend It Like Beckham, the girl gets the ball.  Nothing is what we expect.  The most swashbuckling character in Pirates of the Caribbean wears more make-up than Tammy Faye Baker on a bad hair day! 

In 28 Days Later, a young virgin is prepared for sex with a handful of pills, prescribed by her female friend.  Dirty Pretty Things romantically hinges on whether The Boy will or will not remove one of The Girl’s organs.  Swimming Pool goes into the deep end by suggesting that the best road to breaking sexual abstinence is murder. 

Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle is the summer’s most premature ejaculator.  It is fast and flashy and nothing lasts longer than 30 seconds.  The educational value of this movie is for young boys who don’t know what blue balls are yet! 

The reviews that I have seen for Seabiscuit suggest that the only animals who get to have any romance are the horses.  Mr. Maguire gets to cross the finish line with a Mexican working girl.  First the poor guy is blind in one eye and then he has to go get crabs.  Chris Cooper got to snort orchid cocaine and have a romance with Ms. Meryl Streep in his last movie. Nothing but horses this time.  No wonder these guys are so cranky!  Jeff Bridges should be happy that he is too dumb to know the difference.

Elle Woods chased the man of her dreams in Legally Blonde.  When he turned out to be a jerk, she regained her composure and fell in love with the real Mr. Right.  In Legally Blonde 2, she spends more time with her dog and Bob Newhart than with her fiancé, who is going to marry her in the beginning of the film and marries her in the end of the film.  Elle may take on Washington this time but she forgets that pink is the color of romance.

Terminator 3: Rise of The Machines had a sexually promising title and two naked machines from the future.  An entire club gets to admire The Governor’s equipment.  The Terminatrix manages to walk down Rodeo Drive in nothing but a smile and no one sees her at all.  Typical double standard!  When these two sex machines finally get together, she wraps her thighs around him and squeezes as hard as she can.  The result is a facial injury.  I cannot explain why.  The human beings who threaten romance act like a couple that has been married for thirty years.  Every time she gets upset, he just roles his eyes and stops paying attention.  I was not surprised to notice that they do not seem to have any children in the future. 

Justin, Kelly, Alex, Emma, Catcher Block and Barbara Novak were all neutered by the public when they finally got to the movies.  A reality television couple who are not a couple in reality and who have the sexual appeal of being a studio owner's first wife and was not very interesting.  All that wacky appeal that Miss Kate Hudson has was balanced perfectly by the Wilson Brother whose personality most resembles the volleyball in Cast Away.  The cast of Down With Love were too much like anti-vampires to really be romantic.  They never saw a reflection they didn’t like.  It turned out to be more Coney Island than Barney’s New York. 

The one true love story this summer was The Matrix Reloaded.  When Niobe goes to her one true love, she catches him on the freeway with her windshield.  That is so beautiful!  When an “other woman” demands a kiss from Neo, Trinity threatens to kill her and means it!   But that is not all!  When Trinity gets more broken than the windshield, Neo sticks his hand into her chest and massages her heart.  When is last time you saw a movie where the boy was interested in getting under the girl’s chest?  Imagine what this boy can do for her when she has cramps.  Now, that’s romantic!

Ciao for niao!

Email Patricia Vidal