Carrying around a whack job note after obsessing about this girl for years!!!??? Yeah she'd read it and fall for him! Right! Try it yourself! Get a good lawyer too!
shareI kind of think that Sara Rue's character (that girl that Amanda goes to ask about Preston when she discovers his letter) was like a female variant of Preston, except played for laughs.
shareI'm extremely late to this discussion. You might say I couldn't hardly wait to join it.
Couple of things I keep reading in this thread that I'd like to address - first is the idea that Amanda fell for Preston because he loved her and saw her for "who she really was". He didn't know her, had never had a conversation with her, she didn't even recognise the name when she got the note (which is kinda implausible if she sat next to him in at least one freshman class for an entire year but movie), so how could he possibly know "who she really was". So I would say that Preston was guilty of projecting - he imagined Amanda to have the personality he desired and went with it. Furthermore, his whole thing of how they were meant to be was based on the fact that he saw her first (he's really a nice guy isn't he?!) and that she had the same pop tart as him. And he gets offended when she suggests he's obsessing over a single nothing moment!
The second thing is the claim that he wrote the note at the start of freshman year and didn't think about it again until that night - sorry but this is contradicted in the film - Lauren Ambrose even says something to the effect of "are you gonna revise/edit it for the millionth time?!".
I would agree though that he's not a stalker. Obsessive might be a better word to describe him, and certainly weird-ass. I'd also agree with DCI77's comment that he does seem to have a life away from what we see for most of the movie - he was quite active in writing/journalism at school and seemed well liked by a lot of his peers at the party, in particular the artsy students.
I've been typing for way too long about this. Maybe I should just go and get a g-d life
The only logical explanation for why Amanda fell for Preston is that we have to remember that Amanda wasn't really in the "cool crowd" or the school's "Queen B" until she started dating Mike. In other words, Amanda like Preston was basically a "nobody". So in that context, Preston didn't just see Amanda as that pretty, popular girl that every guy in school wanted, since he was in love with her from the beginning (before her involvement with Mike).
shareIf Can't Hardly Wait came out today, then I can't imagine that Preston would so obviously be branded as the hero or somebody that we should obviously root for. It wouldn't be so "cut and dry" because his obsession with Amanda does border on being creepy and downright stalkerish. When we see Amanda blow up at Preston, is merely due to a misunderstanding instead of Preston's own behavior and attitude about her being at the very least, awkward.
We're not supposed to see his obsession with Amanda as creepy because Preston is being made out to be a better option for her to date than a flat-out asshole like Mike. It's very obvious that Preston's "love" of Amanda is meant to be pure and hopelessly romantic.
If it were up to me, I would've had it that Preston wrote that letter about Amanda just to see if he could get away with it (like a dare or personal challenge), not because he was genuinely or innocently in love with a girl that he otherwise doesn't know personally.
The problem with the movie and what makes it age horribly, is that Preston's entire devotion to Amanda is played completely straight and sincerely.
I'm guessing that the filmmakers didn't want to go with the route that I suggested because it would've naturally, made Preston less sympathetic and harder to root for. But either way, Amanda is practically a trophy or prize for Preston.
I haven't seen this since it was in theaters, and I recall nothing whatsoever from the film, so I'm only going on what you wrote, but why is it a problem that Preston's love for Amanda is sincere? I was in high school once, and remember full well how pure and sincere feelings are at that age. The idea that a guy is completely, hopelessly in love with a girl sounds very realistic to me.
shareI wonder why Denise doesn't call Preston out over how problematic his obsession over Amanda truly is. I get that Denise is Preston's "ride or die" so to speak so naturally, she'll stand up for him regardless. But still, you would think that the one person who knows Preston better than anybody in this movie would attempt to keep him grounded.
Maybe they didn't want to go that route because it would've likely been interpreted that Denise wanted Preston for herself. Had the filmmakers ended the movie by pairing Denise up with Preston, it would've been a reprisal of Some Kind of Wonderful, where the main hero (Keith/Preston), realizes that he's truly in love with his tomboyish best friend (Watts/Denise) instead of the pretty and popular girl in school (Lea Thompson's character/Jennifer Love Hewitt's character, who is also named Amanda).
And it also would've gone against the "wish fulfillment" message that the movie seems to want to make, in that if you really want something bad enough (like a beautiful girl like Amanda Beckett in this case), then go for it.
The one part that I find especially creepy about Preston is when towards the end of the movie, he tells Denise about how cool it would've been to make out with Amanda. It's hard to tell if Preston was merely joking or he was being sincere. And of course, when Amanda finally meets up with Preston at the train station, Preston does make out with Amanda. It's especially weird considering that this was only their second real face to face encounter, and if you want to get technical, their first actual conversation with each other.
sharethat line did seem out of place after all Preston's talk about love, destiny etc.
I think he was joking - at least, he was partly trying to make light of it and make Denise laugh and generally lift the mood while they're saying goodbye, and partly trying to put a brave face on, again for Denise's benefit.
It is though a line that possibly should have been taken out in the final edit
Nowhere near as weird as a character like Felicity Porter. She followed (stalked) her crush all the way to college.
shareYeah, it's a movie. It's fantasy. In a real world, Preston would never have gotten Amanda. In a movie, a decent, honest, loyal, honorable guy like Preston gets the girl, and we want him to because we root for a character like him. It's every guy's fantasy: that a stunningly beautiful girl, who is also a nice, sweet, good-natured, flexible, giving person like Amanda will just fall for a decent guy like Preston simply because he's just a great guy. He doesn't really have to do anything in particular, he just has to be himself, and she'll see him for the great guy he is and fall head over heels.
Yeah, it's a nice fantasy, but real life isn't like that. In real life, females are hardwired, thanks to millions of years of natural selection, to be attracted to high-status men -- and status can come from looks, from power, from wealth, from exceptional charisma, or a combination of the above. But passiveness is not a quality that communicates strength and status. In a realistic situation, a guy like Preston, who has pined ineffectually for Amanda for years, but who never even worked up the courage to walk up to her and say hi...
Yeah, she's not going to fall for him. She's just not. She might like him, but he'll end up in the dreaded friend zone. To have any chance of being with her, he'd have to have shown some simple confidence, which anonymously leaving a letter does not. That would show weakness -- would show that he still doesn't have the courage to face her and tell her he wants her.
The movie fantasizes that the letter is just so eloquent, sensitive, and touching, and that it hits Amanda at just the right time, when she needs the kind of validation a sincere, unselfish admirer would show her, that the movie has it succeed. But in reality, William Shakespeare himself wouldn't get this from just a letter.