But you know what? Instead of feeling humoured, warm and gooey, I felt like the movie was giving across a bad message.
The key aspect of point of Crazy, Stupid, Love is the belief in soulmates. Steve Carell and Julianne Moore are soulmates but he let himself and ultimately their relationship go. In comes Ryan Gosling, a player type reformed by meeting his own soulmate, Emma Stone. And Robbie, 13 year old son of Steve and Julianne, believes that his 17 year old babysitter Jessica is his soulmate. Now belief in soulmates in itself is not necessarily a bad thing. What I disliked about this movie is that it uses it to override all other problems in relationships.
As Julianne says in the trailer, she slept with someone else and Steve moves out of the house without a complaint. He is later berated for *giving up* on his soulmate. But you know what? I'm more concerned that the fact that Julianne already felt the relationship was in such a bad state that she went to someone else was no addressed. So he gave up on their relationship? What about the breach of trust caused by cheating?!
Robbie actively does things that embarrass Jessica, like turning up at her school to declare his love, telling her that he only thinks of her when he has a meeting with Rosie Palm and her 5 sisters, and basically not taking no for an answer (until right at the end when she says she'll wait for him to grow up). To me, this is not cute and romantic, this is the first step to becoming a stalker. In addition, your feelings at 13 are different from your feelings at 23, 33, and so forth. In fact, I'd say that was one of the problems between Steve and Julianne - they may have been soulmates at 16 but they clearly were no longer by the late 40s.
Okay, a player being reformed by meeting The One, okay, I'm not so fussed about that but I did wonder how all those women fell for his lines. I am kinda curious why a guy who seems to love women couldn't seem to form a lasting relationship with anyone until his late 20s/early 30s and instead made do with lots of one night stands though.
Now for people who think I'm bashing romcoms, this is NOT TRUE! I love the genre, I love the improbability of the storylines and how a good one makes you feel all gooey inside. And I don't take them seriously. I mean, come on, I love Pretty Woman but I don't think hookers are good partners for businessmen (or are they....) and I love Enchanted but I know a secret cartoon world doesn't exist through a portal in Times Square (or does it....!). But basically, when Crazy, Stupid, Love ended, I did not feel that warm gooey feeling that a good romcom is meant to give you. I really thought that none of the relationships we saw would end well. Okay, maybe the Ryan/Emma one will be okay if she can get over his past and he can stop with those stupid lines to random women. Maybe they chose to use conflicts that were too realistic (end of love) or too unrealistic (being in love at 13). And if this is what's considered a good romcom nowadays, I'm really worried. You shouldn't walk away from romcoms wondering about the characters' future mental health! Anyway, that's my two cents...I'm gonna watch Amelie again.
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