Only in films...

...does the guy you really fancy tell you that you're beautiful.

I just came back from watching, 'The lovely Bones' at the cinema. After indulging in the intense thriller that explores the idea of limbo, where those that are dead wander while contemplating their unfinished business, I left entertained but focused on a scene that all together held little significance to the main storyline.

The same simple romance scene is replayed in almost every film. The lead is fixated and obsessed with one person and by some stroke of luck they happen to return the favour. It's the teenage girl that writes the name of her crush on all her books, he's the unattainable jock, captain of the football team or wannabe rock star who suddenly utters the phrase she's always dreamt of, 'wanna go out sometime?' (I'm not sure why he is American, that is not essential but you get the gist).

This plot line can be used for many reasons; to set up the perfect happy ending in order to demolish it for a surprise twist, or to set up the perfect happy ending so the audience can suspend disbelief and be transported into a fantasy world for a few hours and escape their humdrum lives. These happy endings are then anticipated and expected by audiences and so if the credits roll without them we feel angry and empty. (I explained this need in the my first post). Unfortunately these fantasy story lines only end up highlighting the absence of them in our real lives and therefore insinuate the harsh reality that happiness is always fantastical.

People fall in love everyday, so we can't assume that each of these romantic journeys haven't created a little fantastical happiness. However, the journeys in our lives that we can honestly say encompass true happiness just seem rare, unusual and can normally be counted on one hand. Isn't that the point? Shouldn't true love be absolute, simply because it leaves no room for anything else? However what if true love is never found? Do we stop living, learning, seeking the fantasy? Maybe that is another reason why film-making has become such an art. It takes us on a journey, a leap of faith, a rebellion without moving from the comfort of our sofa or blows it up on the big screen for that extra magnified experience. It is so easy, so accessible, so fantastical.

After the spectacle of cinema, the idea of Reality creates bitterness which in turns creates resentment. I have read that Christians believe that God created good and evil in order for humans to have free will so they can make the choice between right and wrong. Maybe this can relate into other matters also. Life is messy, complicated, unpredictable, unfathomable and that is why we crave it. We are born with an innate ability to live, learn, create and experience life, all parts of it. If life was a fantasy, everything and everyone would be perfect and films would have nothing to portray. So Orange Wednesdays wouldn't need to exist. I don't know about you, but I think that would be a real shame! Roll on another fictional love story, until the real one decides to appear I will be satisfied with the fantasy.