"The Better To Eat You With."

With my nuptials only a few months away, I've taken it upon myself to revisit several films focused on the issue of marriage. Surprisingly, there does not exist a high percentage of positive stories on the position of forever and ever.

I remember seeing Prelude to a Kiss when I was younger and recall my eleven year old brain attempting to expand twice its size. It's a tricky concept, this notion of forever and ever. A story about a man and a woman having their lives turned upside down on the day of their wedding by a pesky episode of the wife and a stranger switching bodies makes this a little complicated.

No matter how you slice it, marriage gets a bad rap in film. Whether it's a tale of a couple not making it down the aisle because of their feelings of a long last love. A familiar tale of boy meets girl, boy falls out of love with girl. A marriage that falls apart years and years later... Marriage seems to carry a rain cloud over head.

Prelude to a Kiss seemed to be a slight exception. What starts as a common theme takes a delightful twist that leaves you with an unfamiliar feeling.

We meet Rita and Peter, (Meg Ryan and Alec Baldwin) in the blissful throes of that first stage of attraction. They meet, fall head over heels and soon make their way down the aisle. Yet during their reception, an odd elderly man stumbles in an appears out of place. He and the nervous bride exchange a silent moment before engaging in a congratulatory wedding kiss. The sky turns black and immediately we know that they have switched souls. What follows is an unfortunate string of events that clue Peter in to the fact that he does not know who he has married.

We've all seen movies portraying the switching of bodies and how it works for the protagonist to gain knowledge about themselves and the world around them. But I felt like Prelude to a Kiss was one of the greatest exceptions due to the exquisite way the characters interact after this event takes place.

To me it was more of a metaphor for how most couples can have that uneasy feeling surrounding this business of ever after. What if this person changes? What if this person isn't who I think they are? What if one day that thing they do with their fork sends me through the roof? Really, who is this person after all? What better way to highlight those questions than the physical switching of personalities and souls.

Baldwin's character feels the disappearance of his bride and the pang of loneliness in the days following this evident loss. That lively, vivacious woman he once loved seemed to have the light fade behind her eyes. The way she chewed her food, the way she sat in a chair, the way she didn't get his jokes. Everything was gone and he was in exquisite despair.

What the couple learns in the end is important and real. I can only hope that on the day of my wedding, I don't need to switch souls with anyone to learn this lesson. Hopefully I'll learn this lesson the old fashioned way....twenty years from now.

Nobody, Baby But You and Me

Since its premiere, the mere mention of the film Blue Valentine has become synonymous with the phrase: "Don't see it if you're in a relationship." I had to wonder what could possibly drive most of the people I know to repeatedly turn this phrase. What could possibly be so heart breaking and so challenging to get through in less than two hours of cinema?

After finally sitting down to watch the film, I think I'd only edit the phrase by saying: "Don't see it if you're in a bad relationship." Or perhaps, more directly: "Don't see it if you live in rural Pennsylvania and marry someone with little life ambition while you slowly become more heartless and unaffected."

Of course it's sad. Hell, it's devastating. The irony is, I haven't seen in a movie in a long time that created the believable structure of a relationship as well it's destruction. In most stories, you only get one or the other and quite honestly, I've never believed either. When telling the tale of two people falling in love, you don't really see the tiny pieces that get them there.

Blue Valentine did an amazing job stretching out the infinitesimal reasons why people can fall into a state of such perfect, undeniable love and attraction as well as how those things can begin to disintegrate over time. It's real, it's honest and it's terribly depressing.

Over the course of an average lifespan, you're going to be able to relate in a small way to how relationships can fall apart. That first love that broke your heart, that guy you realized was your best friend, the hot guy who you had nothing in common with... We can all relate to how something that seems so straight forward in the beginning can somehow diverge into levels upon levels of complications. People are difficult to relate to. People change over their lifetime and the trick is, to find someone that can accept you at different stages.

The only thing that made me ache over Blue Valentine was the empathy I felt for these characters and how heartbreaking it is when something that was once so beautiful can end so tragically. So, basically...the whole movie.

If you want to skip the heartbreak and simply take away the good parts, I urge you to go download the movie's title song: "You and Me" by Penny and the Quarters. It's been on repeat for last three weeks on my ipod.

"Where Do You Get Off Having Tits?!"

I couldn't sleep last night and sat up watching Just One of the Guys. I remembered this movie as being one that I had seen a few times with friends from down the street. A wee lass of seven viewing this movie while playing with Barbies and contemplating the complexities of gender roles and the coming of age. Suffice to say my seven year old brain couldn't wrap itself around these concepts. Not to mention the fact that there were a pair of breasts involved. "Did she just show her boobies?" Yes, she really did just show her boobies.

Somewhere around two in the morning last night it dawned on me how incredibly backwards this movie really was. Just One of the Guys bit off more than it could chew when the main character finds herself as the subject of sexism from her high school journalism teacher. Sexism in the 80's? The only way to solve this problem is to dress in drag. Am I right, ladies?

Terry Griffith, (first of all, Terry?) decides to write a winning article by using herself as the subject matter, testing her theory on the treatment of boys and girls. I'd like to pause here a moment and point out Terry's transformation into a boy. They made her into the most stylish, homosexual dude that ever drove a white convertible. The only tip she received from her sex-on-the-brain little brother was this: "Itch your balls a lot." With only that knowledge and a bad haircut, Terry decides she's ready to test her skills as a boy in another high school. Here is where the ridiculousness truly begins.

I think the writers, (yes, two men) took everything they knew about women, especially younger women, and shoved them into a 90 minute screenplay. No matter what Terry did, her feminine side just kept showing itself. Overhearing the high school's popular girl Deborah loudly complaining about the missing back to her earring, Terry couldn't help but bless her with her crafty tip. This happens several times and Terry keeps catching herself commenting on girls' shoes, bringing Rick Morehouse lunch and helping him jazz up his wardrobe to score a date for the Prom. It's true...girls are great at cooking, dressing and helping their secret gay crush find a new style.

Now onto Rick Morehouse. I honestly wish this guy had gone on to make things someone on the planet has actually seen. He was a fox. He was the 80's version of the 90's Ethan Embry...the quiet nerd who has a random and amazing interest. Rick's love for James Brown matched Ethan Embry's love for Kurt Vonnegut. When are we going to realize that the guys who are into James Brown and Kurt Vonnegut do not get the hot girl of the school? What in the world were they thinking when they made Can't Hardly Wait and had breathy Jennifer Love Hewitt and her stupid angel t-shirt and platforms chase down Ethan Embry to profess her mutual crush? Ridiculous. I digress. Rick Morehouse... foxy nerd who loves James Brown. How Rick never caught on to the fact that Terry was either a flaming homosexual or that Terry was in fact a stylish girl dressed up as a stylish and petite guy...well, I just don't know. Maybe he's a really stupid foxy nerd.

The movie throws stereotype after stereotype of gender roles in your face. Greg Tolan played by William Zabka for example. (That's right, the jerk from Karate Kid.) He plays another jerk in Just One of the Guys by beating up on high school freshmen and dumping cafeteria tables onto the floor for fun. He also has an entourage of equally ridiculous homoerotic jocks who follow him around the whole movie taking work-out tips from Greg. Keep in mind that Terry is going around handing out fashion advice. Men and women...they just can't help themselves.

They also had Terry offer up the only stereotypes she knew about males. When Rick invites Terry in, Terry exclaims, "Well I was going to go tune up my car and play some football, but uh...I've got time." Once inside, Rick offers Terry a beer to which Terry answers, "Sure, I'll take a brewski." The writers not only generalized their characters, but they made their characters generalize themselves. Even up until the point where Buddy the younger brother, sad from another female rejection, sits and eats chocolates to console himself.

Terry is revealed, of course, as being a girl. This happens in possibly one of the most memorable scenes of the movie. Well, thought the directors, we've got to have her show off her boobs. And show off her boobs she did. It was that pivotal scene at the Prom, when the moment was finally right for Terry to reveal her womanhood secret to Rick. She does this by whipping open her tux to reveal her perfect un-brassiered breasts. "Where do you get off having tits?!" was Rick's reaction. Well, thought the world, she gets off having tits just fine. Ridiculous!


Rick comes to his senses and goes back to tell Terry that being a girl is just fine. Not only that, but that he misses him, err her, oh whatever. They start to leave and Rick hits the final nail on the coffin with, "As long as I can drive." Whatever Terry's article worked to prove failed miserably as she drove off into the sunset with Rick Morehouse behind the wheel, her dumb doily-like dress blowing in the wind. If only she had taken the reigns of this situation, it would've been a completely different film.