Dear Hollywood,
I recently watched two of the most excellent films and wanted to share my admiration of them with you.
Although one was a British period drama about the invention of the vibrator, and the other a Canadian indie about a man seeking a time traveling partner they were the best romantic comedies I have seen this year.
And nobody got marginalised either! Yay.
With a little of the old fashioned ideal about them, Hysteria and Safety Not Guaranteed expressed a sincerity rarely seen in todays cynical portrayal of celluloid romance.
Directed by Tanya Wexler, 2011’s Hysteria stars Hugh Dancy as a forward thinking doctor living in Victorian times whom has grown frustrated with his peer’s old-fashioned attitudes towards science. Dancy is struggling to find his place in the world of institutionalised medicine, and after being fired again for advocating cleanliness in a hospital ward, he begins assisting Jonathon Pryce with the cure of hysteria.
Hysteria in Victorian times was a blanket term for the frustrated or impassioned woman, and was commonly cured by an orgasm achieved through masturbation from a doctor. The service Pryce offers is both popular and lucrative, with many unfulfilled and wealthy housewives filling up his appointment book, and Doctor Dancy finds he is a natural at it.
However his hand cannot keep up with his popularity, and with the aid of inventor and philanthropist Rupert Everett he seeks to find an easier way to assist the “disturbed” women.
The doctor’s naivety towards the “cure” of hysteria highlights the deliberate ignorance towards women’s sexuality at the time, and at one point Pryce even states, “I assure you it has nothing to do with pleasure.”
Maggie Gyllenhaal, on fine charismatic form as the estranged daughter of Jonathan Pryce, provides the romantic interest.
She is as passionate about the struggle of the Victorian woman as she is about the plight of the working class, and attempts to battle inequality at the root with a free school for the poor. However she is permanently at the mercy of debt collectors. Although her character could come off as unconvincingly worthy, the feisty female plot device done a million times before, Gyllenhaal brings enough warmth and humour to the role to make her fully rounded and convincing. She is passionate, but also level headed, gentle and able to poke fun of herself.
The film was pleasant, amusing, and tender. I particularly enjoyed the moment where Dancy spots the soap basin Gyllenhaal provides for the school children, “you believe in germs too?” He utters, falling in love.
The concept was intriguing enough in itself: The birth of the sexual revolution for women, and the application of science in modern medicine, but the romance also didn’t feel like a side note or shoved in to fool a certain demographic to watch a film about vibrators. It was unexplotative, forgoing cheap laughs but still poking good-natured humour at the ignorance around the subject of ladies pleasures.
I actually think it would make a good family film, as it revels in the positive presentation of women and social change. Even Doctor Dancy’s original female suitor, falling by the wayside as he and Gyllenhaal grow closer, does so because she realises she wants more from life too.
Safety Not Guaranteed starred a host of quirky breakout indie stars, Jake Johnson (Nick from The New Girl) Aubrey Plaza (April from Parks and Rec) and Mark Duplass (last seen in Your Sister’s Sister and co-star of The League)
Plaza stars as an introspective unmotivated wannabe journalist, interning for a Seattle newspaper. Along with her lecherous boss and fellow geeky intern she finds herself investigating Duplass, a man who has put an advert in a newspaper seeking a partner to time travel with.
Plaza ends up going undercover, convincing him she has what it takes to time travel, and as she “trains” with him she soon finds herself developing feelings for this quirky but paranoid individual who may or may not have invented a way to travel back in time. The three “fish out of water” characters who have travelled to Duplass’s quiet home town could have been sketchily drawn stereotypes, the awkward but attractive female loner, the arrogant pervert boss and the virgin glasses wearing geek.
However their journeys are fully explored in a well timed and sensitive manner, without any cruelty.
By cruelty I mean the underdog is not made fun of for the sake of it, rather the imaginative Duplass is celebrated for his individualism and imagination and is shown to free up the self imposed tight shackles Plaza has placed on her self. The film encourages adults to let loose, run free and act like kids a little bit more and I liked that message because I am highly immature.
It would have been all too easy to have Duplass be some kind of nut job, and have Plaza back away from him, instead of sharing her personal demons with him. Or have him be slightly less crazy to make the burgeoning romance that much more conventional. Instead he has a mullet, steals lasers and thinks he is being followed by the government.
Both movies were touching and sweet, with fully realised characters and the film makers passion for the subjects was evident. For cynics, these films are an antidote and great examples of films where adults aren’t dicks to each other and people aren’t just selfish bratty one note whiners.
Rather then robots beating each other up, people should show teenagers these films so they appreciate partners should be equal, and being a little bit odd or out of sorts doesn’t mean compromising who you are for happiness.
Love,
Ellen x
