We're happy to present this story from one of our favorite sites, The Good Men Project. Hannah Sloane writes that contrary to what the movies say, women don't want romance — at least not straight away.
I'll often groan when a movie uses a sweeping romantic gesture to nudge the plot along to its natural conclusion. The guy does something wildly over-the-top and ludicrously romantic to win over the girl's heart and, consequently, our two always-outta-luck characters get together. The next and final scene shows them as happy as an eHarmony ad: they're playing ball on a deserted beach with a friendly looking Golden Retriever, or walking down the aisle as confetti's thrown on them by less attractive-looking friends (the comic relief).
The subliminal message here is: do something crazily romantic and you'll seal the deal. According to these movies the bigger the gesture, the better! The more insane the gesture, the more lovable you are! The shorter the amount of time you've known her, the more romantic!
In Love Actually, Colin Firth catches his girlfriend in bed with his brother. He flies to France and quickly falls for a Portuguese housekeeper. Neither of them speaks the other's native tongue (although they do share a thrilling moment of saving typewritten pages from blowing into a lake), so their first conversation is when he arrives unannounced in her hometown with a rudimentary grasp of Portuguese. Rather than covering some getting-to-know-you basics ("So you're a housekeeper . . . did you have to go to college for that?"), he goes in for The Big Proposal. Beautiful, right?
Not really.
Let's rewind to the moment when Colin finds his girlfriend in bed with his brother. His speedy proposal to someone else shrieks rebound in neon flashing lights. Get the rest of the story when you keep reading.
