A former romance novelist (actually a man who wrote under a woman’s name), a studio story analyst, and a middle-aged married man went to see 50 Shades of Grey together, and that’s not the set up for a joke: all three of them are me.
Afterwards I imagined my three disparate personas having a discussion of the movie, and it went something like this…
Former romance novelist (RN): Did they really begin Anastasia and Christian's widescreen romance with a “meet cute” where the heroine takes a ditzy pratfall? Really?!
Studio story analyst (SA): I’m just amazed that a movie that’s entirely Act One – the whole two-hour running time is all setup – had a nearly $90 million dollar domestic opening weekend.
Middle-aged married man (MM): The guy wants to call all the shots and have sex without romance (no big date nights, no sleepovers), and she’s almost okay with that for most of the movie. So this is a male wish-fulfillment fantasy.
RN: I’m confused by critics who saw this as some modern, contemporary take on a romantic drama. The hero tells the heroine she’s “the only one” he wants to do all this with… and the heroine believes she’s the only one who can get the guy to change - she's going to open up his heart and “save him.” This is the basic gist of nearly every Harlequin novel I wrote, and of most romantic fiction since Wuthering Heights.
SA: I’m bewildered by the repetitions. Half of the movie happens in and around elevators. The two “guy impresses girl” scenes both involved Anastasia and Christian flying (one at night where he’s the helicopter pilot and the other by day where they’re in a glider). The same and only conflict in a dozen scenes has to do with whether or not she’ll sign his contract.
MM: He buys her clothes… buys her a car… offers to keep her in high style… and all she has to do is endure his somewhat weird sexual preferences. This is different from most traditional marriages I’m familiar with, how?
RN: They did such a good job of white-washing the down-and-dirty perversity out of the story that the sex seems… clean. You don't even see a red chafe or welt-mark on Dakota’s skin. Other than the fact that I never wrote a romance novel scene where the heroine specified “no anal fisting,” there’s little here that deviates from the conventional form. Except that the story has no middle and no ending.
SA: Even for a romantic drama, the lack of any actual… action is confounding. Lots of walk-and-talks in Vogue or GQ spread-like settings, couple of conversations in bars and restaurants… handful of mildly erotic sex scenes. The basic dramatic motor boils down to him saying, “Come on!” And her going, “Maybe,” until the cliffhanger non-ending. In another elevator.
MM: But I so want my wife to see this. She’ll feel much better about our relationship, in that we have TV-watching dates whenever we want, every night’s a sleepover, and the only “safe words” we need to remember are “I’m really tired.”
All three of us agreed on three things: that Dakota Johnson is a good actress (her good humor the movie's saving grace), that we don’t “get” Jamie Dornan, and that the real star of this show is Universal studio head Donna Langley – because we guys paid to see a movie based on a “mommy porn” women’s book that started out as fan fiction for the Twilight franchise and never felt ashamed of ourselves for a moment.
Now that is Hollywood genius.
3 perspectives. Brilliant!
Posted by: Bradford Richardson | February 16, 2015 at 07:20 PM
mernitman, you were correct: At least one person (Dakota Johnson in the second still from the top) is definitely losing her shirt!
Posted by: Rob in L.A. | February 17, 2015 at 02:48 PM
I just came from seeing "50 Shades." I agree with mernitman: the movie is all build-up to the "lose," with no joyful defeat to resolve it (presumably, that's what the sequels are for). Very unsatisfying. A pale shadow of "Last Tango in Paris." Let's see what kind of legs this neutered puppy has.
P.S. The three-way dialogue between yourself is a great way to structure the blogpost, mernitman.
Posted by: Rob in L.A. | February 18, 2015 at 04:36 PM
Thank you, Bradford!
And thank you, Rob: Indeed, let us see what kind of legs this neutered puppy has (well put, sir)...
Posted by: mernitman | February 18, 2015 at 06:35 PM
That is the Hollywood genius - and the tragedy.
If they can get us to pay for story trappings they don't have to bother with story substance and structure.
If they can make their box office with less - they don't have to bother with more.
How long before our money buys us a screen with no story at all? But then we know that one.
We've seen it before. It's called "The Emperor's New Clothes".
Of course I have to concede that for as long as at least one in three Billy Mernits can see something on that screen - we know it must still be a movie.
Posted by: Joanna Farnsworth | February 23, 2015 at 09:03 AM
Hi Joanna: I feel your pain. The truth about "50" is that the movie could have been... well, anything, and opening weekend would've been huge, regardless, so in a sense your rhetorical "how long?" question has already been answered.
Posted by: mernitman | February 24, 2015 at 12:03 PM
I took a 2-hour nap during the SAG screening I went to.
Posted by: binnie | March 06, 2015 at 06:52 PM
Binnie: And you were wise.
Posted by: mernitman | March 06, 2015 at 10:26 PM