some annoying absurdities... *spoilers*

I totally agree with you. Very well put! I think that Mirabelle was dumb in thinking that this old rich guy would want anything serious with her after saying to her that he didn't want anything with her.

I definitely see where you are coming from. I'll start out with the fact that I like the movie, I do not love it, but I would watch it again. I never end up hating Ray, nor do I really feel bad for Maribelle. I thought that through the film they were trying to show that situations like Maribelle/Ray, where one person is obviously in love and the other isn't, can be used as a learning device, and that someone can grow through relationships that do not work out. But if they were trying to show that Ray is someone to hate, and Maribelle deserves sympathy, then I will agree with you, they clearly missed their mark.

Based on everything you said, what gave you the impression that the filmakers want us to hate Ray? You keep talking about what the filmmakers originally intented but that seems strange considering we can only tell what the filmmakers intended by what manifests in the movie. It seems more like you just expect Ray to be the antagonist because it's typical Hollywood formula for there to be a bad guy. I think part of what makes it so much more devastating is the fact that he's not a bad guy, he just didn't want the same thing Maribelle wanted. If they wanted us to hate Ray they wouldn't have shown us that he really believed Maribelle understood the nature of their relationship. In most Hollywood triangles there's the guy that likes the girl but she doesn't like him back, and he ends up being really nice and the perfect guy for her, and then there's the guy who the girl really likes but he turns out to be a jerk and that's when she realises the other guy is really nice and the right one for her, but this isn't one of those movies. Maribelle and Ray's relationship is about miscommunication, they simply interpreted things that were said between them in different ways, basically hearing what they wanted to hear out of what the other person said. This is something that happens in real life.

As for the anti-depressant thing, if you haven't felt depressed in a while and it seems like everything's going perfectly, it's very easy to stop thinking logically about it and just think, im happy now i don't need the drugs anymore.

It's a movie about imperfect characters, none of them are all bad or all good, which in fact makes this film far less ridiculous than the majority of Hollywood movies.

You totally hit the nail on the head - especially about Maribelle's stupidity/naievity. She never once thought that Ray was a weirdo when he sent her the gloves?!? Umm..hello, stalker alert.
I also hated how BOTH Ray and Jeremy wrote on their notes to Maribelle "I want to have dinner with you". What about asking her if she would like to have dinner with them?! This movie seemed extremely patriarchal to me.

I was trying to figure out why this film just didn't grab me the I'd hoped. I really like Steve Martin's and Claire Dane's past work; it looked good, and told a grown-up story in an intelligent way. But I think your post went a long way to answering this for me. I just didn't really "connect" to these two characters or their personal quandaries/dysfunctions. I couldn't believe that a smart, attractive woman like Mirabelle wouldn't get the point earlier, or that Ray would do half the things he did - the confessional letter was the last straw for me. If he never committed himself to Mirabelle, what was there to confess? Seemed like a self-serving dump on her already fragile ego to me.

I don't think we were supposed to hate Ray, or feel overly-sympathetic with (or pitying) Mirabelle. The problem is - as you articulated - I imagine we were supposed to FEEL something important for them. I wanted to, I tried to - I didn't.



"Politeness is to human nature what warmth is to wax." ~ Schopenhauer

The point was that Miribelle was swept away by the way Ray courted her-- fancy dinners, expensive gifts, and a knack for being very suave. It was, in her mind, true adult romance and throughout the movie you kind of get the feeling that Miribelle is trying very hard to grow up, that she feels stuck. Ray was not in love with her but he did care about her and that was her interpretation of love-- someone who seemed to have it altogether ( the opposite of the boy in the beginning was sloppy and awkward)

Miribelle had built everything up in her head and when she let herself come down from that ideal she realized that imperfection was ok, hence her healing from Ray's rejection and finding a true emotional connection with Schwartzman's character.

I wasn't annoyed by the movie, but then again, I didn't watch it with a "black or white" mentality. Nor do I think that was the intent of the film maker. Admittedly, I disliked Ray at first (I agree with the person who said "stalker alert" after he sends her the gloves - LOL), especially during his speech. When he gives the "I'm not looking for anything permanent right now" line, he is basically saying "I just want a friend with benefits/booty call." Most women know this, unless they're in denial. But at least Ray was honest about it, albeit a little late. So then I was a *little* annoyed when Maribelle chose to ignore the writing on the wall and stubbornly kept her head up in the clouds. (I mean, c'mon - that's just like a woman, now isn't it? How much more realistic can you get?? LOL) But the fact is that the film maker protrayed both of these characters not as good versus bad, but as two *human beings* who are prone both to character strengths AND weaknesses. That worked for me.

What I also liked about this movie is that both Ray and Maribelle learned from their experience, and *changed* as a result, becoming stronger, better people. Ray finally realized and admitted that he did really love her, and I loved that he acknowledged it and apologized to her. And Mirabelle woke up from the idealistic, romanticized dream she'd had and was able to face (and embrace) reality without becoming bitter. She was an overcomer. And shoot, even Jeremy improved himself! Frankly, I sympathized with all three characters because they each had their lovable side and their not-so-lovable side; they were real.

On a side note, if you find it unthinkable that a person on ANY kind of long-term medication would suddenly stop taking it, then you clearly don't know anyone who takes such medication. As the symptoms disappear (due to the meds), people tend to think they're cured and don't need the meds anymore. So they stop, then the symptoms reappear. Trust me, I've done this with my diabetes meds before. (Wow, my blood sugar looks great! Guess I won't have to take these anymore. Hey, why is my sugar level so wacky all of the sudden?) LOL Stupid, yes, but it's just human nature.

While I disagree with a couple of your points, I do agree that Mirabelle did not handle herself as intelligently as the audience is led to believe that she is. It is very hard to connect with either character in any meaningful way, because I never got the sense that either one of them ever had any interest in who the other really was. Ray seemed to see only Mirabelle's physical beauty and her willingness to make herself available to him when he wanted her, sexually and otherwise. Mirabelle really didn't seem much better, because she seemed to only see what she wanted to see in Ray, and that had little in common with who Ray really was. Neither seemed too concerned with getting to know who each other were on any other level. They were just filling a missing space in their lives with each other.

I disagree, however, on the assumption that the filmmakers wanted the audience to hate Ray. Steve Martin wrote the novel on which the movie was based, and he wrote the story about a relationship that he really had with a young artist years before. I doubt that he wrote it to portray himself as a sleaze. I think he just wanted to portray a relationship that is born from two people who are looking for very different things, and how even what begins as a simple arrangement can get muddled when people's emotions aren't reciprocated.

I also don't think that Mirabelle's reactions to Ray's indifference were all that unrealistic. Naive, yes. I was in a relationship that started much the same way as Ray and Mirabelle's (except for the age difference.) The man was very clearly hesitant about pursuing a serious relationship, but he wanted to see me quite regularly. He didn't want his family or the people in the town where we lived to know we were involved, but he loved taking me to his work functions and told his out of town friends that I was his girlfriend. I put up with his "having his cake and eating it too" for over six months, until I'd had enough and told him that I deserved much better. He agreed and we dated for two years, and even talked about marriage. In the end, he never could completely give me all of his heart. It was naive of me to think that there would be some sort of hollywood ending after such a shaky beginning, but that is actually how many women secretly feel. Even mature and intelligent women sometimes hold onto overly romantic fantasies, especially during lonely periods in their lives. It's not terribly evolved or pragmatic, but it is common. I think Mirabelle very obviously had a romanticized image of Ray and was in denial through most of their relationship. Once she faced the hard truth and saw what they had for what it trully was, she was able to appreciate someone who really cared about her. It's a lesson that many women learn only after being disappointed by a fantasy.