I Guess I'm Just Not Your Typical Romantic

Nicholas Sparks, romance author, recently chose his five most romantic films for "Entertainment Weekly." His choices correspond with a list of my own called "Chrissi's Five Most Repugnant Films."  The only film I don't hate from his list is "Casablanca," although not because I found the movie romantic.  I saw that film years ago, very surprised at how many lines from it had seeped into our popular culture.  I sat by myself in the crowded "Revue" theater, trying to be serious, when suddenly I heard: "Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine," which I'd only ever known previously as a sample from a song by one of my favorite '80's bands, "Big Audio Dynamite."  If that wasn't enough, there were also lines like: "Here's looking at you, kid," a variation of "Play It Again, Sam," and "I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship," all of which I'd originally heard as a kid spoken by a very popular character named "Bugs Bunny!"  So I do like that movie, but mostly due to its unintentional entertainment factor.

Now, here is my rundown of why I hate his other four picks:

1.  "Ghost"  I found it depressing and frightening. There's nothing romantic about one half of a couple dying.  And now I hear there is a Broadway musical of it coming out.  Oh, the torture!

2. "Titanic"  I had similar feelings for "Titanic" (with the added bonus of seeing blue people floating in the water at the end of the movie), but my biggest complaint is calling this movie a "love story" when it really is a "lust story."  Rich society girls don't fall in love with poor guys, but they just might have a lustful fling on a sinking ship.  That, I'll buy.

3. "Dirty Dancing"  The female lead's name is "Baby" because she's supposed to be so innocent, but about halfway through the film, she is naked and in bed with Patrick Swayze.  Turns out there's nothing innocent about "Baby" after all.

4. "Pretty Woman"  Absolutely, hands down, the worst of the bunch!  It's scary that people have nicknamed this movie "A Cinderella Story."  This is not a movie for young girls to one day emulate, particularly because of what's obvious to me but apparently not to others -- that the female lead (played by Julia Roberts) is a working prostitute!  Worse still, the movie dances around this issue by having Julia Roberts spill her guts about her seedy past to her "Prince Charming" (a/k/a "Paying John") without ever actually admitting that she does indeed have sex with men for money!  Watch the movie closely and you'll notice this.  I remember sitting in the theater that day waiting and waiting....

One movie I do find romantic is a movie based on one of Sparks' own novels called "The Notebook."  I hated it at first for the same reason I hated "Titanic" -- rich girls know to go for rich guys, they don't go for poor ones.  Initially, I had only seen the two leads as a young couple, but one night, I saw the movie on TV in its entirety.  The scenes of the now-old couple really got to me.  My husband found me crying in my recliner, and I tried to explain to him what I'd just seen:  "He didn't need to be in a nursing home.  But he went there to be with her," and "She wrote the book he's reading to her because she knew she was getting Alzheimer's, and she wanted to remember their relationship."  I was barely audible.  Now, I was truly moved by all of the movie because I knew I was seeing a real love story.

I don't buy that whole "love at first sight" thing.  "Lust at first sight," yes, but true love is what comes over time when a couple live together on a daily basis, some days are ordinary, others extraordinary, but that's the kind of love I believe in.

Who knows?  Maybe I'm wrong, and the leads in "Dirty Dancing" and "Pretty Woman" would have stood the test of time.  Maybe Ingrid Bergman did not get on that plane and instead wound up staying with Humphrey Bogart.  I'd watch the film one more time to really see how their characters interact to make my final judgment, yet I'm not confident I'd be able to see that movie again without constantly being reminded of Bugs Bunny!

Yes, You SHOULD Remember Those "Auld" Friends This New Year!

For some reason, my husband and I have always made friends with people older than us.  A LOT older than us.  Back when we were newlyweds (in our early twenties), our two best friends were a couple in their early sixties. My husband was a grad student then, and he met Nadia and Julian every single morning at "Galaxy Donuts," for coffee and hour-long conversations.  Julian was Polish and Nadia was German and, although Christians, they were both in work camps during World War II. They eventually immigrated to Canada and had a lot of stories to tell.

Mostly they talked politics or world history.  My husband nicknamed them "The Prophets" because they often watched TV shows of the apocalypse! Sometimes we'd rent old black and white movies and watch them at each other's apartments.  Or we'd have Polish food at Polonez, our favorite neighborhood restaurant.  But four years later, my husband and I moved to a different part of town, far away from the Polish area, and since none of us had driver's licenses or cars (you didn't need them in the "big city"), we never saw The Prophets again.

I'd like to think that Nadia and Julian are still kicking around somewhere, healthy and happy, together in the "old folks home."  When you don't know what happened to someone you once knew, it's best to imagine them as they were when you knew them, and of course, to never forget them.

My other "old" friend was my former piano teacher, Helen.  I'd known her my whole life.  She was my next door neighbor who began giving me lessons when I was six.  Every Tuesday, for the next ten years, I sat in the first floor sitting room outside the small room she gave lessons in, as I waited for her to finish with the student who studied before I did.  I never had to ring the doorbell.  Because I was her friend, I could just let myself in and wait for my lesson to start.

I never lost touch with Helen and had even spoken to her on the phone a week before she passed away peacefully at the age of 86.  Some of my favorite memories as a child were the nights before our annual weekend of piano recitals when Helen would invite my best friend, Ania, and I to sample some of the cookies that Helen baked every year for the recitals.  My favorites were the delicious powdered sugar and walnut crescent ones. Ania and I would be bubbling with anticipation.  We were nervous and excited at the same time for our weekend's performances where we played solos but also duets together.  Right up until the year that Helen passed away, she still lamented at how one of her biggest regrets was that she never got Ania and me on videotape playing at the recitals.  She had gotten her later students, but she hadn't been tech-savvy enough to have a video camera during Ania's and my heyday.  She was a dear and caring woman and, to this day, still one of the best friends I've ever had.

New Year's is a time to remember all our dear friends, and to cherish the ones we are still blessed with. Happy New Year to all my friends, both old, young and in-between!