Love & Lust on Film: Scarface, Bridget Jones and Lessons Learned
Published May 27, 2004
Carole King and Carly Simon and so many others went through the same heartache but they didn't run away; they belted it out in songs like "You're so Vain" or "Total Eclipse of the Heart" (Bonnie Tyler), and Abba and Fleetwood Mac who made a life-style of heartache and fucking - because that is life. These women seem a lot braver to me.
***
Bridget Jones, as we know, is really Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice all over again but with a contemporary spin. What I love about Bridge Jones is that she's honest about her life and her pain; that she's not a perfect size four, and that she's all T and A and not afraid to show it. , The aloof and cool size four girls of control would never dream of wearing the sexy little numbers that Bridget does; they gain a pound and they're on Atkins or South Beach. We get to see Bridget painfully waxing her own bikini line and wearing "scary stomach holding in panties" to help chances of "reaching crucial moment." which we all know is a thin euphemism for getting laid. She's not what society tells her she 'should' be in any way; she's overweight (though, frankly, I think she looks great), she's emotionally all over the map and messy, she's unmarried, and though these things concern her, she still marches on and keeps trying.
Bridget gets hurt and gets fucked (literally and metaphorically) and is a sweet and not-so-sweet girl. An honest wanton sex goddess, with messy emotions that she doesn't try to hide. And most admirably, when she's dumped for "an American stick insect" (the kind of cool and aloof girl with the make up etc etc. that I've been talking about) allows herself a day or two of stadium self pity, involving lots of vodka and ceremonial dumping of self-help books all about how to catch a man, and sits crying in the bath with her stockings hanging over the rail to try, she nonetheless snaps out of it and decides she "will not be beaten by a bad man and an American stick insect."
It makes me want to cheer, even if it is Hollywood manipulative. Before you know it, Bridget is on television sliding down a fireman's pole in a mini skirt with her less-than-perfect but beautiful Zaftig ass; She is the Carole King of our times because she gets herself back up and tries again. Bridget has found some balance and she lives her life and knows that because she fucks a guy, doesn't mean she's committed to anything - which, by the way, is a very guy attitude.
Her counterpoint is Diane Lane in Unfaithful - yet another Adrian Lyne morality play - a director I like despite myself. Yes, Candice, the central character is married and ten years older than Bridget, but the issues are similar: issues of fitting in and being socially acceptable and giving yourself permission to enjoy sex. But Candice is the size four with the bikini wax and the right make-up and her butter-blonde highlights and zero-fat physique and she's cold, whereas Bridget is warm.
- Love & Lust on Film: Scarface, Bridget Jones and Lessons Learned
- Published: May 27, 2004
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- Section: Video
- Writer: Sadi Ranson-Polizzotti
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----these are girls with giant blue vibrators tucked away in their Pier I night-tables----
Sadi, I did not want to know this!!!!
Nice work, and interesting to see things in your perspective - though you use the word "fuck" more than Tony Montana!....;-)
apologies for language, and i think you're right ... i hadn't realized it was so full of bad language. i promise to be better next time!
thanks all for reading... hope you found it interesting... very gratifying to know it's being read...
of course, it's just my opinion... and grateful for all feedback.
sadi
ahhh...i see the typos and i am so sorry. so now with the language and the typos, i hope i haven't totally lost anyone... though maybe for other reasons. I will be more careful in the future. thx. to all for reading... and please keep posting comments if the spirit moves you. i plan to write every week... so now Onward to next topic !~ Thx for being such a receptive audience; your comments mean everything.
sadi
S, if there are typos (I fixed a couple) please fell free to go back in and edit. I reedit my own posts all the time. That's why they are perfect.
Sade
I thought your colorful use of language was totally refreshing (you write in the way I talk)- and suited the topic perfectly!
I really enjoyed the article and your style. Bravo!
awww, shucks. glad to hear it, Anthony! Working on other stuff, so you'll have to check that out too... if the spirit moves ya. ;)
keep cool
sade
Sadie, just because you've had a few bad experiences in life doesn't mean true love doesn't exist..and NO I do not believe "the virginal bride" is a "silly charade." Love is hard though no doubt.
"true love" requires as much or more work than false love
Sadi sez: "...I feel most beautiful when I am alone in my garden, wearing that slightly see-through slip that I love and my Doc Marten gardening boots and no underwear and no make up and my high-lights have grown out and I'm covered in freckles and my breasts are loose in my shift and I feel full and ripe and full of life and that the world is mine for the taking."
Whoa.
Sadi, coupla things:
* got jpgs?
* Universal Law #33: ALL men are either gay or insensitive pricks; there are no exceptions.
* ie. You shoulda been a lesbian; women are great!
* "Masturbation: Sex with someone I love!" -- Woody Allen
* I've never been one to define myself relative to others' expectations, but man, thanks to age and wisdom, all that crap means even less. God rewards the patient survivors with enlightenment coupled with flaccidity.
* got jpgs?
hey Shark: excellent points all, and jpegs exist, but alas not for sharing.... ;)
the older i get, the more i wonder about this "true love" business. Yes, Eric is right; if it does exist (my issue), then it requires as much or more love than false love, no question. But i wonder how we define true love anyhow? One may know what is true for onesself, but what of the other and how they feel? How do you know whether or not their love is true?
Yes, without a doubt, i should have been and almost was a lesbian, and odd you mention since i was just saying this to my friend P. today, who was agreeing with me. I was deeply in love with a woman who is a lesbian many years ago, and we were and are good and dear friends but things did not progress for myriad reasons - too complicated to get into here, and i think though, to the point, much to the regret of both of us likely. It's too bad. Things would have been totally different for me and for her too, no doubt. Life would be nothing like what it is today.
Shark says All men are either gay or insensitive pricks, which i hate to believe, but experience is showing me that this may have more truth than initially believed and i do not WANT to believe that, so am happy to be proven wrong at any time. Please... show me that this is NOT the case.
That's all i have to say. Shark, my dear friend, i would send you jpegs, but we're not that close, are we, so how can i do that? sorry sweets...
love to all,
sade
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Whoa, that's something Sadi, thanks and welcome! Never has gardening sounded so appealing.