mamadeb: Writing MamaDeb (Default)
mamadeb ([personal profile] mamadeb) wrote2005-12-18 10:40 am

(no subject)

I was watching Kate and Leopold today. I missed the first half hour or so (maybe more - I forget when I started watching) and, my *goodness*.

What a terrible mistake she made.

I probably don't need this, but .

I kept yelling at the screen. Yes, it's a romantic comedy and so I shouldn't be thinking of these things, but she goes back in time 125 years to marry an impoverished English duke. Which means she's giving up independence (Meg Ryan had just been made the head of the New York division of an ad agency - something she'd worked very hard for), modern medicine, electricity and comfortable clothes to be the entirely dependent wife of a duke who no longer has any avenue to get money other than selling or leasing his ancestral home. Since they must live in a certain style, they would also be in great debt. Mid-19th C clothes were uncomfortable and often health hazards.

She has been removed from her friends and family, including the brother she loves and the world she understands. And she will regret it. Probably around the time she loses children to scarlet fever - preventable by vaccine and curable by antibiotics, or faces childbirth in less than sanitary conditions with no choice about using anesthetics at all, or with the possiblity of a c-section if necessary.

(Meanwhile, my husband is shouting about going from the Brooklyn Bridge, which was stalled in construction then, to Madison Avenue - five miles - on foot in 20 minutes.)

Kinda kills the romance, I know, but then I'm not sure the tight white pants were proper eveningwear, either. Or the fancy embroidery, even for a Duke.

*Sigh*

[identity profile] fatale.livejournal.com 2005-12-19 01:12 am (UTC)(link)
The man was brilliant no doubt, but he didn't get journalism. Rather, he didn't get being a grownup and taking your job seriously because a magazine is putting its good name on your shoulders.

I believe he's practicing law now--so perhaps he's putting his talents to other good use. It really is a shame, though.
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[identity profile] shezan.livejournal.com 2005-12-19 01:17 am (UTC)(link)
Yes, but there are a gazillion lawyers and very few brilliant writers. I remember his piece on the psychic hotlines, and the stories he made up of people calling him (working on the hotline) were Brokeback Mountain-quality, all about loneliness and people not in control of their lives. He had a talent for immediacy and the telling detail. I tell you, I'd pay for fiction by that guy.