Broey Deschanel
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Anatomy of a Rom Com (early access)
🕑 Added 2024-03-29 21:59:26 +0000 UTCAnyone But You was supposed to revive the rom com, but it's missing something. This video breaks down the components of the Hollywood romantic comedy, and what gives it that magical quality!
SOURCES:
Yohana Desta, “Maybe Nancy Meyers Doesn’t Want You to Stop Focusing on Her Beautiful Movie Kitchens” Vanity Fair (2019).
James J. Dowd and Nicole R. Pallotta, “The End of Romance: The Demystification of Love in the Postmodern Age” Sociological Perspectives, Vol. 43, No. 4 (Winter, 2000).
Nora Ephron, “Moving On, A Love Story” The New Yorker (2006).
Megan Feeney, “The Plight of the Rom-Com in the Post-Romantic Era” Cinéaste, Vol. 47 (4) (2022).
Helen Fielding, Independent Columns (1995).
http://bridgetarchive.altervista.org/index1995.htm
Hadley Freeman, “Nancy Meyers: ‘I don’t see a lot of movies about complicated women … I think it’s gotten worse’” The Guardian (2015).
Roberta Garrett, “Female Fantasy and Post-Feminist Politics in Nora Ephron’s Screenplays” Journal of Screenwriting, vol. 3 (2) (2012).
Brian Henderson, “Romantic Comedy Today: Semi-Tough or Impossible?” Film Quarterly , Summer, 1978, Vol. 31, No. 4 (Summer, 1978).
Benjamin Lee, “Anyone But You review – slick but soulless romantic comedy” The Guardian (2023).
Paula Marantz Cohen, “What Have Clothes Got to Do with It? Romantic Comedy and the Female Gaze” Southwest Review , 2010, Vol. 95, No. 1/2 (2010).
Adrian Martin, “In the Mood For (Something Like) Love: The Situation of the Rom-Com Today” Cinéaste , Winter 2013, Vol. 39, No. 1 (2013).
Nancy Meyers, “Life Isn’t Like the Movies (Even if You Write the Movies)” The New York Times (2020).
Doris Milberg, The Art of the Screwball Comedy: Madcap Entertainment from the 1930s to Today, McFarland (2013).
Rachel Syme, “The Nora Ephron We Forgot”, New Yorker (2022).
Stephanie Zacharek, “Notting Hill” , Salon (1999).
Comments
Heather Redacted
crazy how often people overlook the idea of charm, charisma, and chemistry in writing romances, considering screen tests and chemistry tests used to be such an important part of filmmaking. some people walk on screen and youre immediately in. it doesn't matter how hot these people are, if there's not a spark there's not a spark, it can't really be faked.
Broey Deschanel
yesss I think a good rom com today would zero in on our current anxieties about intimacy and the chaos of the wold around us!
Mega
It's crazy because I just started reading bell hooks' all about love, and this video has fueled my thoughts on love in the 2020s. In college, I had a professor say the key to romcoms was having a problem that feels insurmountable to the two would-be lovers (riches vs rags, culture clash, homophobia, etc.). I feel like people are so apart nowadays, and a good romcom that explores those divisions could do really well. But the protagonists in these newer romcoms are like, floating in some time void out of the zeitgeist. Maybe we need to see a jaded Gen Z and live in their struggle and see them win in love despite. Or a despondent millennial too bothered by societal collapse to care for something as inconsequential as love. This is kind of a lot, my bad! But I feel like movies like Anyone But You are so unaware of the current moment and current anxieties (aging in covid, wars, hinge, the price of a one bed one bath), that the stakes are almost nonexistent. Her biggest worry is she quit law school. His biggest worry is he wants to date some other skinny girl. It's so non-specific and broad and I hate Sydney Sweeny's marble mouth!
