• You are currently viewing our forum as a guest, which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our free community, you will have access to additional post topics, communicate privately with other members (PM), view blogs, respond to polls, upload content, and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free, so please join our community today! Just click here to register. You should turn your Ad Blocker off for this site or certain features may not work properly. If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us by clicking here.

Things Romantic Movies Get Wrong About Relationships

atrueloveme

New member
Joined
Sep 28, 2017
Messages
2
MBTI Type
intj
Pop media does not always portray realistic relationships. Most romantic stories are written to make viewers empathetic, but are often just made-up fantasies. Sure, you might see a boy chasing after a girl in a subway, like they do in movies; but unlike in movies, they don’t usually end with a kiss. In real life, it ends with a restraining order against the guy. That’s just one thing that romantic movies get wrong about relationships.

Another example is how there always has to be a third party, a rival for true love, a love triangle. Romantic movies introduce such characters in order to add tension and conflict (which I understand are needed to tell an engaging story), but most real-life relationships are already beset by common problems such as debt, bills, and whose turn is it to take out the trash. Not all real-life relationships have a love triangle, and if some do, then it’s usually resolved during the courtship stage.

Speaking of debt and bills, why is it that there’s always a difference in status between the couple? Like how the guy is a rich, pampered descendant of a Welsh royal—King Arthur himself even—and the girl is just from down the corner of Edison, New Jersey, or vice versa. It just adds more fantasy to the story.

But despite all of my gripes about what romantic movies get wrong about relationships, I still enjoy watching them. I have fun rooting for the guy chasing for the girl in the subway. I celebrate when the guy triumphs over the rival and wins the girl’s hand. I swoon when the man of lordly caliber sweeps the pauper girl off of her feet and marries her despite the gap in their station. I enjoy romantic movies for what they are—made-up fantasies.

Do you have any suggestions on good romantic movies that portray relationships realistically? Let me know.
 

equinoxx

New member
Joined
Dec 20, 2017
Messages
30
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
9w1
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
Ugh. I could go on forever about how much I hate the way romance is portrayed in the media.

Romantic relationships are shown to be magical, of utmost importance, extremely intense, and basically the "center" of life. Romance is often put up on a pedestal above other types of relationships. Many protagonists in movies will put aside everything for their budding romance and their romantic partner. They won't listen to their friends & family, they'll forget about their own passions and dreams, they'll leave their life behind... all for their beloved. Movies often portray love as something consuming.... if you love someone, you think about them 24/7, sacrifice yourself for them, revolve your entire life around them, spend every waking moment with them...

...and this is portrayed so often that this is most people's idea of a "perfect" romantic relationship, but I don't know. I don't see it as healthy.

The strong "love" shown in movies isn't always exactly love, it's infatuation. Sure, this infatuation will linger during the "honeymoon phase" at the beginning of a relationship. But the phase doesn't last forever in the way that the movies make it seem. Of course, excitement can last in a long-term relationship, but it takes work to keep it there. And a relationship isn't always going to be all lovey-dovey, kisses & hugs, butterflies & fireworks... Seeing each other's ugly sides is important, too.

Also, your partner should not consume your entire life. I don't know why this is portrayed so much in the media. It's not healthy. A couple needs space now & then to keep the relationship healthy.

As much as I enjoy romance, I think both the good & bad sides of love need to be shown more in movies & TV shows. Romantic gestures and kisses are nice, but I want to see a couple who sits on the couch in PJ's together looking like a mess, zoning out and watching TV, barely speaking to each other, but still enjoying each other's presence. A couple that argues, but doesn't make it into the end of the world; at the end of the day, they still crawl into bed together and kiss goodnight. Also, couples who focus more on the "growth" aspects of their relationship rather than physical affection & nothing else. There's much more to a relationship than being touchy-feely and saying "I love you".

Sorry for the rant, this is just something I think about a lot haha
 

Mesmeric_Moon

Soul Reaver
Joined
Jan 31, 2017
Messages
185
Enneagram
784
Instinctual Variant
sx/so
Things romantic movies get wrong about relationships: almost everything.
 

Neokortex

New member
Joined
Sep 4, 2016
Messages
186
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
461
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
Yes, Eagle vs. Shark (2007). (m) INTJ vs. (f) INFP
Ingmar Bergman's Scener ur ett äktenskap (1973) (I don't remember the types, gotta watch it again and to the end)
 

Mozzie610

New member
Joined
Jun 15, 2017
Messages
27
MBTI Type
ENFJ
Enneagram
2w1
All the things already mentioned here, but also how they always show a "happily ever after" type ending. It makes it seem like once you find THAT guy or THAT girl that its smooth sailing from there and super easy. But that's not how relationships work. Being in a close relationship with any other human being is going to take effort, even if you are extremely compatible. Misunderstandings happen, feelings get hurt, and hardships disrupt lives. People who have life long relationships are not usually just "lucky". They usually put a lot of work into their relationship to make it work. It annoys me how it always looks like everything is just super easy once you find love.
 

Magnus

Member
Joined
Mar 19, 2018
Messages
216
MBTI Type
INTJ
Instinctual Variant
sx
There's a necessary divergence from real relationships and the crap shown in movies. The few things movies get right are mostly politically incorrect inconvenient truths. They're not a useful guide.

People who are smarter than me believe that IN_J's learn about relationships through A-B testing since they probably can't depend on charm or inter-personal chemistry. There's a fair amount of pattern recognition going on with their learning curve. That has the not-so-romantic side effect of demystifying the mystical. But the up-side is that when they find a successful relationship, they will be committed to making it the best it can be.

The most vaguely realistic movie I've seen about relationships is High Fidelity. The couple in that movie have a recognizable dynamic with fairly understandable grievances with each other. It's easy to believe that they would have a conflict with each other. But it's also easy to believe they could make it work long term. It passes the squint test, mostly.
 

chubber

failed poetry slam career
Joined
Oct 18, 2013
Messages
4,413
MBTI Type
INTP
Enneagram
4w5
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
I quote:

Avoidant people's preference for interpersonal distance and emotional detachment favors viewing sex and love as quite distinct; indeed, in the first studies of avoidance within the adult close-relationship domain, Hazen and Shaver (1987) found that avoidant people tended to view romantic love as a Hollywood fiction that does not exist in real life.

Mikulincer, Mario, Attachment in Adulthood: Structure, Dynamics, and Change. Kindle edition, loc. 8868. The Guilford Press, 2007

I don't know of a movie myself where I thought that can become true.
 

rav3n

.
Joined
Aug 6, 2010
Messages
11,655
Entertainment movies as a generality, rely on exaggeration in order to communicate their plot. With romantic movies, they exaggerate the infatuation phase and turn thoughts into actions. I wouldn't take any of it seriously. Analogous, taking the Thor movies seriously.
 

Magnus

Member
Joined
Mar 19, 2018
Messages
216
MBTI Type
INTJ
Instinctual Variant
sx
Analogous, taking the Thor movies seriously.
If a would-be king from Asgard ever finds himself banished to Earth until he learns his lesson, I imagine he would find Thor to be the most instructive movie that relates directly to his situation. I'm sure Elon Musk knows what to do if he ever finds himself captured by terrorists in the Middle East or something now.

Those movies may be making cinema worse but there could be some applicability to them someday.

But maybe not...
 

Coriolis

Si vis pacem, para bellum
Staff member
Joined
Apr 18, 2010
Messages
27,230
MBTI Type
INTJ
Enneagram
5w6
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
What they get wrong is thinking I want to sit through a romantic movie. :sick:
Amen to that. I have no patience for those, and even less patience when a perfectly good spy movie takes a derail to show us what the main character is doing under the sheets with his/her gf/bf.
 
Joined
May 19, 2017
Messages
5,100
Amen to that. I have no patience for those, and even less patience when a perfectly good spy movie takes a derail to show us what the main character is doing under the sheets with his/her gf/bf.

Right. So many movies feel like they have a romantic element crammed in. I’m always pleasantly surprised when a male and female duo isn’t romantic in a film. It’s very uncommon however.
 

Coriolis

Si vis pacem, para bellum
Staff member
Joined
Apr 18, 2010
Messages
27,230
MBTI Type
INTJ
Enneagram
5w6
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
Right. So many movies feel like they have a romantic element crammed in. I’m always pleasantly surprised when a male and female duo isn’t romantic in a film. It’s very uncommon however.
Have you ever read the Thomas Covenant chronicles by Stephen Donaldson? They are a prime example of the highlighted, at least in book form.
 
Joined
Mar 6, 2018
Messages
54
MBTI Type
INTP
Enneagram
5w4
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
I enjoy romantic movies, but they're like a guilty pleasure because I feel that they reinforce unhealthy subconscious expectations about what relationships should be, and I'm not immune to this, either. In fact, I think I absorbed a lot of these expectations as a child, and that had a negative impact on my early dating life (late teens to mid twenties).

One of the tropes that bothers me the most and hasn't been mentioned yet is the Bad Boy With a Heart of Gold. (Occasionally you see his female counterpart, the Troubled Young Girl in Need of Guidance, but not as often.) With this trope, you get a protagonist who transforms a confirmed commitment-phobe, all-around jerk, or emotionally unstable person with the "power of love." The message this sends is not only deceptive but also dangerous, leading far too many well-intentioned people to get mixed up with users, abusers, and other unhealthy types because they truly believe love can "save" them and turn them into suitable partners, just like in the movies. When that doesn't pan out, these well-intentioned people are often badly hurt and have to unlearn the Hollywood lesson in a most painful way. I really wish the film industry would ditch this unrealistic story line and give us love interests who model healthy relationship behaviors. Movies need conflict, of course, but it can come from drama that's external to the couple or even interpersonal tension that doesn't require the main character to win over a love interest who treats them like crap.
 

Snow as White

ƃuıǝǝs | seeing
Joined
Dec 29, 2017
Messages
471
MBTI Type
ENFP
Enneagram
4w3
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
they get everything wrong, really. i feel like they are often made for teenage girls and unhappy wives (who were teenage girls watching these movies once). twilight and 50 shades fall under this heading too.
 

Coriolis

Si vis pacem, para bellum
Staff member
Joined
Apr 18, 2010
Messages
27,230
MBTI Type
INTJ
Enneagram
5w6
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
I enjoy romantic movies, but they're like a guilty pleasure because I feel that they reinforce unhealthy subconscious expectations about what relationships should be, and I'm not immune to this, either. In fact, I think I absorbed a lot of these expectations as a child, and that had a negative impact on my early dating life (late teens to mid twenties).
I find romantic movies are usually full of short-sighted people making stupid decisions for the wrong reason. I see enough of that in RL. Plus they are generally boring as heck.
 

Red Memories

Haunted Echoes
Joined
Jun 3, 2017
Messages
6,315
MBTI Type
ESFP
Enneagram
215
Instinctual Variant
sx/so
they get everything wrong, really. i feel like they are often made for teenage girls and unhappy wives (who were teenage girls watching these movies once). twilight and 50 shades fall under this heading too.

but but but I LOVE TWILIGHT D:

fifty shades can go in a dumpster tho.
 

Lark

Active member
Joined
Jun 21, 2009
Messages
29,569
I wonder if anyone can think of any movies that get it right?
 
Top