Speaking as a single female (well, mostly single, but that's another story entirely and likely will not be told here), I am so sick of seeing sappy commercials for movies inspired by Nicholas Sparks novels. The man writes a good romantic novel, if that's your cup of tea. For the vast majority of the single, female, 20-somethings though, facing unremitting reminders of our singleness as we struggle to finish school/find jobs/ actually have functional family relationships and friendships is really not high on our priority lists. And, yet, year after year, right after New Years, every movie production company in existence (hyperbole, friends, hyperbole) seems to put out trailers for the saddest, sappiest romantic movies or the dumbest, most formulaic, watch-only-with-much-wine romantic comedies, or "rom-coms" as it were. Now don't get me wrong. There is nothing wrong with a girls night in with wine, snacks, nail polish, and sappy girl movies, but some of them are awful for anyone that doesn't do feelings so much. As a friend and I tend to say, "feelings are for the weak." And after a bad week, "I'm gonna drink until I don't feel feelings." Obviously neither of these statements are accurate. One refers to not enjoying talking about feelings ever, and the other refers to needing a single gin fizz to take the edge off. By the way, and this is totally unrelated, gin fizzes are RIDICULOUSLY good. New favorite. But, I digress. Movies that have little substance OTHER than feelings piled upon mushy feelings, make me squirm inside. The tongue in cheek hyperbolic emotion of satirical movies, I totally dig. Raw emotion in war movies is perfect. Pretending that actual, living people experience the emotions and situations that are intrinsic in a romantic comedy storyline is utterly ludicrous. And, frankly, as a 20-something female, mildly demeaning. Sometimes (a lot of the time) we don't give a flying monkey if we have a significant other. Hell, I have the greatest platonic life partner known to man. So there's that. I don't need some movie telling me that all the crap things that happen in my day to day life would just suddenly get better and the clouds would open upon a quadruple rainbow and it would rain candy if only I had a serious relationship. Why you may ask? Not because I'm against the idea of relationships, but I choose not to define my life by them. I am me, regardless of whether or not I'm in a relationship. All that happens when I am, is that I get a little more codependent, tend to go to sleep at more reasonable hours and I cook a lot more. Let's be honest, that's the best part, not having to cook for just yourself anymore. So, why then should some Hollywood writer suddenly decide that I'm not good enough or happy enough on my own? I've known people that stayed in miserable relationships for years just because they were terrified of being alone. Ugh.
I think that's the end of my rant for now. Except for this - my current frontrunner for a movie that is going to make bank on Valentine's day is "Warm Bodies." Who doesn't want to see a zombie-murder-love story?
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