films that equate infidelity with romance - The English Patient (1996) Discussion

[–] Whiffle 14 years ago

Let's not forget the epic "romance" Doctor Zhivago. Nothing more romantic than abandoning your wife and children!

The straightest line between a short distance is two points.

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[–] rrb 14 years ago

Don't forget to damn Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra. Bad, bad playwright!!

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[–] Lexiii67 8 years ago

This movie enraged me.

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[–] blameline 14 years ago

Hanover Street- also taking place during WWII; not a bad movie, but the spouse that's cheated is a really decent guy. Made the affair a real mess...

Next thing they'll be breeding us like cattle. You've gotta tell them. SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE!

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[–] falseprophet616 10 years ago

You've got a spoiler in your sig, at-least put that *beep* in spoiler tags...

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[–] whoiamnow 8 years ago

The movie was 14 years old at the time of the OP's post. Spoilers, really?

(Consider a review site if you don't want spoilers. This is a DISCUSSION board.)

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[–] falseprophet616 8 years ago

People are born every day. Your point is invalid.

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[–] whoiamnow 8 years ago

Why should I censor myself on a discussion board, regardless of the person's date of birth?

(Consider a review site if you don't want spoilers. This is a discussion board.)

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[–] falseprophet616 8 years ago

I wasn't even talking to you initially

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[–] Swashbucklist 8 years ago

Screw you. I can't stand people who think that a movie or TV show's age determines whether or not they can freely drop spoilers. There are a ton of Hitchcock movies that are decades old, is it okay to spoil the endings for every single one, aşśhole?

I once thought it was wrong to ever spoil a movie or show unless there was a spoiler warning on the thread. Then I heard from somebody that two weeks after a movie's release was the appropriate length of time for a spoiler-free period. Then it was only one week. By next year, it will only be TWENTY-FOUR *beep* HOURS after its goddamn release date, and soon after that, it'll be the time it takes for the credits to stop rolling.

If a movie came out twenty years ago and somebody is only getting around to seeing it now, that's fine. They shouldn't have to be forced to see every movie they ever have and ever will want to see right this minute just because you don't care.

You know what everyone complains about, but isn't as bad as spoiling a movie? Turning on your phone in a theater. It's just a tiny, stupid light! I would much rather put up with an itty-bitty distraction than know that Rinzler was actually Tron, or that Walter White dies at the end of "Breaking Bad," or that Mr. Whiteside sets everything in order for himself and gets up to leave the Stanley residence in high spirits, then slips on the front steps again and gets carried back into the house to continue his occupation.

Next time I go to a movie that I'm seeing for the second time, I'm gonna shout the ending to everybody before it starts. If they really cared about the movie, those idiots should've already seen it by that point, according to you.

...

Requiescat in pace Pete Postlethwaite.

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[–] bkliu 14 years ago

Well, if you stop loving your husband and start loving another man, there's nothing selfish about seeing the new man. It would be hard to immediately break it off from your husband... Love is unselfish, you must go where your heart takes you.

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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] rrb 14 years ago

"I have no respect for you if you cheat."

Who cares?

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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] rrb 14 years ago

LOL! Like someone gives a damn what you think. You're rigid, pompous moralizer who imagines she has a right to sit in judgment on other people.

BTW, why aren't you denouncing the husband in the picture who tried to kill his wife with Almasy? That doesn't bother you, but the romance between Katherine and Almasy does? Hypocrite.

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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] rrb 14 years ago

"I have to assume that perhaps I touched a nerve...are you yourself engaging in unfaithful activities?"

ROFL! More pomposity!

Don't give yourself airs when called on for condemning others for very human behavior. What a shame the beauty of this tragic story eluded you--2 passionate people, plainly meant for each other, but unable to be together BECAUSE OF HER DEVOTION TO HER HUSBAND. Katherine left Almasy because she couldn't live with deceiving Geoffrey. Her compassion and shame (which a small judgmental person like you would happily foist on someone) undid her. Had she simply walked out on the husband she was fond of, but not in love with, she would've been better off.

Fire away with all the condescension and highhandedness you want. You're being ignored.

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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] debora_cs 13 years ago

I totally agree with you. Although I did like some of the movies you mentioned... (for example, I don't feel so bad when then party being cheated on IS an abusive jerk), but I DO dislike it tremendously when movies romanticize cheating, especially in marriages, and/or especially if the other party doesn't deserve it. Just plain wrong in my opinion.

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[–] rachaelov 14 years ago

Maybe if you found yourself in that kind of situation, you'd be less judgmental, allocating shame and respect... its a messy business, and your emotions are pulled this way and that. And when it comes to finding a love of your life - - -

And anyway, in this film, she actually stuck with her husband, despite being in love with another.

As to the opening poster - this is life - it happens a thousand times a day all over the world, and is as old as the human race. It's a core experience of many people - I'd say more people have had affairs than haven't at some time in their lives. This type of film reflects and explores that reality

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[–] TettiTatti 14 years ago

I'm sorry, but I don't think that "sticking with her husband" negates the affair she had. She's not noble, she had sex with another man while she was married to him. I doubt if your spouse cheated on you but said "don't worry, I'll choose you" that you'd be okay with it.

I understand that it happens, probably a lot. It doesn't make it romantic. It's incredibly sad.

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[–] rrb 14 years ago

What's sad is that you're so wrapped around your moralistic axle you can't see anything else. I'll ask about this again: do you find Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra "disturbing" because Antony was married to anther woman?

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[–] TettiTatti 14 years ago

I didn't say that everything that depicts adultery is poorly written ("bad playwright" - really??), or even disturbing. I'm not advocating Sharia Law here. I just don't think adultery is "romantic". I can't help but feel for the wronged party. I instantly felt sorry for Bill Pullman's character in Sleepless in Seattle, and the character of Ken in An Affair to Remember. I found absolutely nothing romantic about the relationship in The English Patient. I don't get why everyone thinks it's a great romance. She's an unfaithful wife, period. Why is that so difficult for you to understand?

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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] rrb 14 years ago

"I didn't say that everything that depicts adultery is poorly written ("bad playwright" - really??), or even disturbing."

LOL! No one said you did. No one said anything about poor writing. Who are you responding to?

My "Bad, bad playwright" comment about Shakespeare, for producing a masterwork about the romance between Antony and Cleopatra, was plainly mocking your prissy tone. Did that really elude you? Are you that dense, or just pretending not to understand?

So you see nothing in the story of TEP other than "She's an unfaithful wife, period"? And Antony and Cleopatra? Does that boil down to "He's a cheating husband, period" to you? Are you really that limited by your preoccupation with sex outside marriage?

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[–] TettiTatti 14 years ago

Calm yourself, my friend. I posted an opinion which you clearly don't share. Not the end of the world.

I saw nothing of any value in TEP because it bored the living snot out of me. I suspect that many people tolerate the slow pace of the film because they think it's romantic. I just didn't find it particularly romantic because of the nature of their relationship.

As it happens, I've been on a quest to watch every best picture winner in chronological order, and at the time I was in the 90's. So right in a row I saw Katherine cheating on her husband (96), Rose cheating on her fiance (97), Viola cheating on her fiance with Will Shakespeare (who is cheating on his wife)(98) and of course everybody cheating on everybody (99). No one would call American Beauty a "romance" but the other 3 are, although I did not list Shakespeare in Love in my original post because she was in an arranged betrothment and he was long separated. Then I started thinking about other examples and I thought "when did adultery become romantic?". Hence my posting.

I can't intelligently comment about Antony and Cleopatra because I'm just not that well versed on it.

It sure would be nice if we could have an intelligent conversation withtout resorting to insults. I'm game if you are.

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[–] rrb 14 years ago

Oh please. More condescension. Why would I want to have a conversation with someone like you? Again, LOL!

You chose to come to the blog of a stunningly crafted tragic romance, which many people adore, and demean it. Don’t pretend to you didn’t expect to be called on it.

You pigeonhole stories dealing with relationships outside marriage as “s/he’s unfaithful, period “. I asked if you apply the same label to Shakespeare’s magnificent Antony & Cleopatra, since its heroes are what you would call an “adulterous” couple. You claim you’d have to be more familiar with it before you answer. You’re plainly trying to avoid showing that you’d respond by viewing this acknowledged masterpiece through the narrow lens, “S/he’s unfaithful, period.”

And your reaction is so sad. I saw TEP with my mother, a devout Catholic in her 70s, and a friend the same age, who was a nun. They both loved it. Obviously, their relation to their moral standards didn’t include judging others for behavior they know to be human, though they wouldn’t engage in it themselves. And they appreciated the beauty in this film, including its story and insight. What a shame that your beliefs only motivate you to condescend.

I know you’ll feel compelled to have “the last word.” Go ahead. I won’t see it.

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[–] TettiTatti 14 years ago

"why would I want to have a conversation with someone like you" he said in his SEVENTH RESPONSE to MY POST.

I listed 12 movies off the top of my head as evidence of my point. Your brilliant retort was to call me names and tell me I'm wrong. Your star witnesses: your mommy and a nun. Well, you certainly got me there.

Look, I know you may find it hard to believe, but I never read Antony and Cleopatra. I didn't realize I had to be conversent in the collective works of Shakespeare in order to have an opinion on a movie that had nothing to do with Shakespeare. If I had known there was going to be a quiz today, I would have studied, professor. Honest.

I tried to be civil. I tried to just have a discussion. You insist on insults. Welcome to my ignore list.

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[–] oaksjm 14 years ago

rrb you got a real stick in your butt

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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] Tales-from-the-Goondocks 12 years ago

Shut the fück up already. Nobody cares if, by your awful moral standards, cheating on wives and husbands is a great thing to do.

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[–] craigbhill 10 years ago

Thank you!

~ Native Angeleno

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[–] AtrusDent007-2 10 years ago

I wonder if all the men defending Katherine would be so eager to leap to her defense if THEY were being cuckolded?

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[–] craigbhill 10 years ago

OMG the pace of the film has nothing to do with the romance of it. The pace is like anything that takes time, quality filled in. Like your life, which must be miserable to you because it's soooo slooooow and has taken years to inch along. The fact it bored you is all you need to know about it: You're not ready, if ever you will be, for rich drama that requires, like a good book, heft and permutation to its story to leave its audience feeling enriched, not bored. You're stunted by your superficial morality. It's impossible to have a mature discussion with one who is not mature. Your discovery that unfaithful relationships are to everyone else the subject of romance SHOULD tell you something. You must live a very linear and dull relationship with life itself, which is overflowing with aspects that you hate which adults accept as reality. Again, do some growing up first and watch relationships all around you, and maybe one including you, CHANGE, "betraying" someone or other. That's the way the world turns, baby!

~ Native Angeleno

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[–] craigbhill 10 years ago

Your peculiar definition of "romance" is a You problem. Love of any type between people is specifically romantic once it gets beyond the comic book level you seem not to be able to advance from. The rest of the world can handle it just Fienne. And did, understanding, appreciating and loving her tragic character as portrayed by an excellent actress.

Next you'll be saying it isn't "tragedy" but Justice! because everyone got theirs.

~ Native Angeleno

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[–] falseprophet616 10 years ago

I honestly felt a sense of justice when Geoffrey Clifton's character flew the plane into the ground.
Then later on, Almasy is all "my love died because of my name, my wife died because I had the wrong name". No, she was obviously killed as a direct result of Geoffrey's actions, which were a direct response to your and her actions of adultery/betrayal, and she ain't your wife, you prick.

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[–] lulia 8 years ago

I found absolutely nothing romantic about the relationship in The English Patient. I don't get why everyone thinks it's a great romance.

That may be because you use "romance/romantic" the wrong way. There is nothing "moral" about romance. Romance is about feeling, emotions AGAINST reason. Although I wouldn't be caught dead calling "morals" reasonable, they certainly are rules that society generally follows, and therefore can be opposed to "romance".

So I think that we can consider that you dislike romance in general, given it does not necessarily follow society's "rules".

I can conceive someone feeling hurt, betrayed by the unfaithfulness of a partner. I just don't understand the concept of faithfulness as an essential rule. Maybe I'll understand if or when I experience it, but I don't get the indignant anger it throws some people into. Marriage (or common-law union) does not make you blind, deaf, unfeeling, and one person does not necessarily provide you with everything you need.

I don't understand certain moral rules, or rather, the rigidity with which some people follow and enforce them.

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[–] rachaelov 13 years ago

TettiTatti

I'm sorry, but I don't think that "sticking with her husband" negates the affair she had. She's not noble, she had sex with another man while she was married to him. I doubt if your spouse cheated on you but said "don't worry, I'll choose you" that you'd be okay with it.

No, I wouldn't be ok with that. The chances are it would destroy the marriage, especially if I knew she was in love with another, and not me. If I wanted her to stay in this kind of situation, it seems to me at heart, it would become about me possessing her - even if I loved her - rather than resuming a marriage that wasn't a sham on some level.

This is not to say I wouldn't be distraught, and see her as having been cruel and betrayed me, and being angry at her.

But really, how is it we say we have betrayed someone, by falling out of love them? Can we help falling out of love? Or falling in love with another? It seems to me, we don't have much of a choice there... tho yes, we do over how we deal with those feelings.

It's a story of tragic love - what do you do when you find the love of your life, when married to another? More to the point, what do you feel? What would it lead you to do... and what if you have fallen out of love with your spouse? Do you crush your love and spirit for another, for someone who you don't love? How does this make anyone happy? What effect does this fact have on the marriage from then on, unless both of you think it was "just a mistake"? It plants poison in the marriage, to which there may be no antidote, with the best alternative - repression, never talking about that again, while it always being a factor.

These feelings reek havoc on you, when you're in the middle of it - and not looking from an emotional distance.

I understand that it happens, probably a lot. It doesn't make it romantic. It's incredibly sad.

It's all of those things: sad and tragic and romantic - I mean romantic in a bigger sense than school sweethearts getting married - romantic in the complicated, messy, emotional, tortured sense, that these situations just are.

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[–] craigbhill 10 years ago

You confuse your dislike of her character by imposing attributes to her she clearly stated in the film she did NOT like about herself.You want to make her a villain in your own mind by imaginging her character thought herself "noble" so you can knock her down as unvirtuous. What a child you are! The story does not judge her husband negatively for being hurt by her and ultimately seeking revenge on the both of them. You apparently identify eith him (what does that say about your relationship?) and take her adultery personal. She stayed weith him, clearly signifying to you she thought her place was with him, not her lover. It's a love story! You say it isn't romance, i suggest you bone up on what constitues a romance, the Frenchg romances of the Middle Ages were ALL about infidelity asnd love. Ever heard of the Romance of the Rose? The fiction of the triangle of Arthur, Guinevere and Lancelot spun by poets 1000 years ago? All Romances! Grow up!

~ Native Angeleno

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[–] Oceans300 12 years ago

And it doesn't matter how many children or caring lovers you leave behind in an unselfish quest for #1, trivial commitments like that be d@mned.

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[–] milo44 11 years ago

Indeed .. True love is something that most people never find , but it there's a chance .. then go for it .. you only live once .

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[–] dgroberts27 11 years ago

That is the biggest load of crap I've ever heard, from top to bottom. First of all, by your "heart" you mean your feelings, and there is nothing stupider and more selfish than letting your feelings dictate your actions. Feelings simply boil down to desire, and that which we desire is often very bad. And your feelings are by their very nature completely selfish. Love is action, not feeling. Acting upon one's feelings just because you have them is not only utterly selfish, it is incredibly irresponsible. True love is treating a person well even if you don't feel it for them. Never is someone more loving than when their emotions are opposite their actions. If a person stops loving their spouse and then shacks up with another person, that is pure selfishness. It isn't romantic, it is destructive and vile.

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[–] falseprophet616 10 years ago

Hit the nail on the head my friend.

And what's with all this 'one true love' nonsense?! No such thing.
People are capable of loving many different people, thinking and striving for 'the one' is the stupidest thing. People have a measure of compatibility with any person, that fluctuates over time and sometimes the bad will outweigh the good and working on it simply isn't a viable option any longer for both people's health/happiness (it's usually the case that you weren't right for each other form the get go, this is only discovered after truly getting to know each other).

If anything you choose your 'one' through, I don't know, the contract of marriage perhaps?
That said, I'm not sure monogamy is truly for everyone. But even polygamous relationships have strong foundations of trust, boundaries and communication like any good relationship should. Which Katherine had none of with her husband, because she was too busy being an impulsive bitch.

It didn't even seem like Almasy and Katherine got on together that well. As hinted in the movie, she probably would've moved onto the next guy at some point anyway...

(Not that I care much for the institution of marriage, mostly legal construction that serves little, if-any 'romantic' value)

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[–] Arkoth 10 years ago

there is nothing stupider and more selfish than letting your feelings dictate your actions

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[–] Royalcourtier 10 years ago

You have missed the point entirely. The comment was not that cheating is selfish, but that infidelity is equated with romance in these films. I agree with the OP.

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[–] jhpen22 10 years ago

Situational ethics = zero ethics.

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[–] sandifay62 13 years ago

I don't believe this movie equated infidelity with romance. Almasy and Katherine weren't romantic, they were lustful. There love grew over a short period of time, but they were making mistakes and suffering for it. They were doomed.

Hana and Kip were romantic briefly and not hurting anyone.

The movie was simply giving examples of different relationships, some that went wrong, some that had potential, but all were just character studies of how love, lust, and longing affected them. The movie wasn't telling the audience how to feel about romance.

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[–] redxherring 13 years ago

I think the tradition might go back even farther. The word "romance" itself is linked to the courtly romances of the middle ages, which were often centered around an adulterous relationship between knight and lady (Lancelot and Guinevere, Tristan and Isolde are just the two most famous examples).

So it seems that this kind of idealized illicit relationship has come down to us through the ages. Why? Maybe it's simply an ingrained cultural myth, akin to that of the damsel in distress. But if you think about it, the subject could thrive in fiction and cinema because it has such great narrative potential: the Love Triangle carries with it, inevitably, dramatic internal and external conflicts. It also raises fundamental issues (fidelity, or ownership in relationships as we see in English Patient), and prompts the audience to take a side--we might love the adulterers for being capable of a love that doesn't respect any bounds, identify with their human frailty, or hate them for their infidelity, their betrayal of the idealism of sacred vows.

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[–] 13 years ago

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[–] bringonthelucie 13 years ago

Does Casablanca really belong here? They did have a romantic affair in Paris, but once in present day (Well, in the film's present day) Casablanca, Rick and Ilsa do have another chance at romance but Rick ditches it in favor of Ilsa's safety and for the benefit of the overall war. So I wouldn't say that infidelity as romance is that movie's ultimate value.

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[–] Duane505 13 years ago

Also, Ilsa thought Laszlo was dead when she started seeing Rick. She dumped Rick because she found out Laszlo was still alive. So not really adultery.

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[–] nilanjana-bhattacharyya 13 years ago

Let's not forget that sappy favorite "Serendipity". The protagonists hurt people who love them and who they have made promises to, only to be able to follow their "Destined" partner whom they have met for half an hour. A book turning up is the biggest clue to your true love, actions like loving, caring, sticking with someone through thick or thin, who gives a *beep*
It is also often shown that a cheating incident only serves to bring the protagonist back to his or her senses and hence is justified. Remember "The Devil Wears Prada?" She goes to Paris, screws some hunk with no regrets, comes back, doesn't even TELL her boyfriend about it, and apologizes and goes back to her old self and all is well with the world.
I am not saying people do not have reasons to cheat but that doesn't make it romantic does it? I get that people can be upset, drunk, fed up and do something stupid or get entangled with someone - but to call that romantic is crossing the line.

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[–] matthew101junk 13 years ago

If you're talking about the 1946 version of The Postman Always Rings Twice (I haven't seen the remake, so I don't know if it's different), Frank and Cora are basically lusting after each other rather than actually in love. People rave about the chemistry between John Garfield and Lana Turner, but it is strictly carnal. Their affair leads them to murder Cora's husband, who is not particularly romantic but treats Cora well and is played by a sympathetic actor. After the murder, they turn on each other, so in the end I thought the movie was more about the foolishness of trying to achieve something through immoral means.

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