It sucks that Hollywood has trapped romance in a corner for what feels like a solid decade. It hasn’t always been this sexless, barely romantic, low-key cuddle landscape in the movies though. Growing up in the 2000s, during my peak puberty times, has made me relate to the 00s in weird ways. One of which is thinking the 00s were synonymous with romcoms. License to Wed, Bridget Jones’ Diary, Matthew McConaughey, Hugh Grant, heck, even raunchy comedies had a solid romance subplot. Outside the movies, music was exploding off with the punk bubblegum prism of romance, gliding across genres. When I look back, while I was never in, or experienced, love I always associate the 00s as a softer and more romantic time.

Sadly, that’s not the case now. Regardless of the anxiety and doom/ gloom of the world, and society falling apart, movies in general are less loving. Horror has had a fantastic decade that hasn’t been felt since the 80s. Science Fiction has mostly focused on the destruction of our world and how powerless we are to stop it. Neither genre generally focuses on romance in more depth than ‘these characters are together now.’ And comedies are the worst offenders. While they do acknowledge love, it’s super cynical and usually gross in favor of a joke, rather than to support character. It’s quite depressing how many comedies will view romance as nigh abusive in service of a laugh.

Thankfully, that doesn’t mean romance is dead in Hollywood. It’s been trying to make a comeback. Crazy Rich Asians was a fantastic nod to the 00s romantic epics. Love, Simon was a sweet high school romance that we haven’t had in quite some time. Bros was a raunchy comedy that took its romance seriously and painfully. It may not be as prevalent as yesteryear, but they’re slowly coming back and breaking through the straight white romance wall.

So, with all that said, I want to walk down romance lane by exploring movies that cover aspects of romance that have stuck with me over the years.

Your First Time

It seems inevitable that the prevalence of movies has had some impact on your firsts growing up. For straight guys, it’s seeing an actress’ boobs. You may hear their tale of awakening around a campfire, or smelly locker room, but for me, it had to do with a sex scene. I doubt it was the first sex scene I had seen in a movie, but it was the first that stuck with me.

Back in 2006, when the skies were pink and emo punk was hopeful, my mom and I came across a movie we both wanted to see. The movie included Poison Ivy from Batman & Robin as a super woman. How could I say no to that? My Super Ex-Girlfriend is a movie that never entered my personal rotation. I never bought it, talked about it, or gave it much thought after that one and only awkward watch with my family. Maybe that had something to do with it, I don’t know, that’s too Freudian for me. I guess what I’m trying to say is I have no idea if this movie is still good. I haven’t watched it in over a decade, and yet I still remember clear as day this iconic sex scene.

Having super powers means super strength, so the screenwriter of Thor thought it would be funny if during the stereotypical sex scene the woman not only takes the man spot on top, but also uses so much thrusting force that she is literally ramming the bed into the crumbling wall. I’m pretty sure that was the beginning of my habit of walking out of the room whenever anything sexual happened on screen if I were watching a movie with my family.

That scene, however awkward I felt in the moment, has always been an amusing memory. Hollywood has a very narrow view of sex. They love to dramatize it, making it all serious with the bed sheets, heavy breathing, arched backs, but this scene destroyed that notion. What once was too adult for me to have watched turned into an amusing joke. Though unlike something akin to Family Guy, where the joke ruins the sexual politics, My Super Ex-Girlfriend does a good job of avoiding that with ease. The boyfriend, played by a dashing Luke Wilson, clearly finds the situation odd, but he goes with the flow. When it comes time to break up with her the focus isn’t the sex. He acknowledged with his buddy how weird the sex was the next day, but it wasn’t shamed or played for laughs other than in that moment when the expectation of sex changed.

That’s why the most prominent component about sex, whenever that pops to mind, is how goofy it is. Hollywood may have a vision that sells tickets to all those allosexuals out there, but at the end of the day it’s all a facade. There are too many factors at play with sex about for it to be perfectly serious and magical. Most of the time, the magic is about fun and most people who do have sex do it for that reason. So yes, let it be goofy. Let expectations be unexpected.

Another perfect example of this is in The Bronze. The sex scene is played for laughs, but not at the expense of the characters. It’s actually enhanced by them! Why? Because they’re two gymnasts and the sex they’re having can only be done by gymnasts. They’re cartwheeling into each other’s bodies and hanging off of rings outside their window in order to achieve pleasure the only way they can, and it’s really funny because that’s not the expectation of sex, and yet it’s probably the closest Hollywood will ever get to showing sex in a meaningful, consensual, way.

Bodies of Ecstasy

It seems that once you have awakened, you’re awakened at 110%. Self-control has not met you yet, and so once you find something new it can’t help but be exploited over and over again until you learn your limitations. Some may call this an addiction, others self-love, maybe your experimental phase, but ultimately it is a state of excess. You find something so irresistible during this specific moment that you have to explore it until you understand it.

Murphy, sadly, found this out the hard way. Gaspar Noe’s Love is a breath-catching movie about American masculinity where the viewpoint of the male main character, Murphy, makes a mistake and ruins, what he feels, was his perfect life. Love takes on so many facets of love; the spark, the ecstasy, heartbreak and acceptance. It’s a commentary on how women treat relationships and sex differently than men. It’s heavy, but what I want to focus on are the first three minutes of the movie.

Love opens on Murphy and Electra, naked in bed, masturbating each other. There are no fancy camera tricks. Everything is seen and on full display. Then once Murphy finishes he wakes up, and now the audience knows that the first three minutes were a dream of Murphy from his past relationship. What’s fascinating is after finishing the movie that’s the part that Murphy misses from his time with Electra. It wasn’t their early phase of new and exciting, nor was it their later phase when they wanted to get out of their comfort zone and try something new. Instead this man, who loves sex and thinks with his dick most of the time, literally, reminisces about a sexual time he didn’t have penetrative sex that focused on his partner.

Wow. I knew this was a French movie going into it, but even if it isn’t Hollywood it still feels shocking that a film out there would go to such lengths to lay down a thesis that love is shared with both partners contributing and feeling joy. And to have the scene be about masturbation is mind blowing.

Masturbation is such a shamed act, at least in the states. Pop culture labels people who masturbate as someone who can’t get a girlfriend/boyfriend, or it’s part of a joke (American Pie made an entire franchise on a masturbation joke!), or worse, people view it as beneath them, skipping it over entirely for sex because that’s what society expects. It’s crazy how such a simple subject can be a tangled web of shame, and yet Love validates it saying you don’t need penetrative sex to be in love, to experience love, or justify love. What matters is what you do to show it, and for Murphy it apparently was when he and Electra were at their most comfortable, where they just wanted to pleasure each other.

That’s the missing piece in Hollywood. American movies are so focused on getting there for the sexy dramatics, maybe go juvenile and have a sex scene purely to see boobs, maybe a man-butt if we’re lucky, but in doing so they skip the most meaningful part of relationships, which I believe are the small things people tend not to look at that make us happy. Hollywood sex scenes are very much performative. Murphy and Electra were not. They were in the moment. Let’s have more movies focus their relationships on being in the moment.

Eternal Want

If there is a consistent critique, above all the rest, about Hollywood couples onscreen, it has to be the question, “Why are these two together?” Okay, we know the reason. Two hot people doing hot things make audiences hotter. But, why? So many scripts are about two characters being together, but nothing in the script details why they should or should not be together. What brought them together (other than sex)? What keeps them coming back for more? Where is this eternal want coming from that no Hollywood couple… oh wait, one does exist.

Morticia and Gomez Addams. They are the power couple to strive for. Regardless of its rating, The Addams Family from 1991 had so much built up sexual tension between these two that it melts the film. The genius part about their relationship is the sex isn’t important. So many relationships are built around sex, so many stories have sex as the dramatic widget, but not with the Addams’. Sex is most likely good. It’s implied. It’s probably incredibly kinky, but that isn’t what fuels their relationship. If anything, that’s the cherry on top. A delicious snack to the main course that is their relationship. What so many people find appealing about Morticia and Gomez Addams are their undivided interest in each other’s lives.

They are in love with each other in every aspect of the word. Morticia speaks French. Gomez swoons. They bond over a funeral, they both have the do-me eyes. Their kids are trying to kill each other and yet they praise their parenting. Every moment of their lives is as interesting as that initial spark that fueled their love to begin with. Nothing has waned over the years of marriage and kids. If anything, it grew. Their love was a foundation for an even deeper love they found in this next stage at life being parents. It’s inspirational to watch a relationship on screen carry so much weight without the blanket of sex to smooth over a cheap couple. Their desire is noticeable, front and center, and that’s what a relationship should be able to carry until death do ye part.

It’s hard to come up with solid relationships in Hollywood because the cheap side of storytelling is finding drama in every scene, and unfortunately so many people see relationships as the drama focal point. It really takes a relationship to the next level when you take it all off the table and you have to build up a healthy relationship that a couple could thrive on. The closest example I can think of off the top of my head, that gave me the same emotions as The Addams Family, would probably be If Beale Street Could Talk. I might be able to come up with a couple after a few hours of research, but it really shouldn’t be this hard to find a movie couple that are strong together, have a reason to exist, and encourage to stay together. That’s the dream.

Hollywood has a long way to go. I didn’t even mention films pre-90s because I don’t think Hollywood is like that anymore. There are wonderful romances and couples in their black and white era with meaty scripts and iconic lines, but Hollywood doesn’t remember them and I wasn’t introduced to them until adulthood. And while Love affected me after my 20s it still hit me and stuck with me as hard as the rest. There are moments in modern films where they’re getting there. I just wish it were more common so that we can accept love in many forms, not just a steamy, sweaty scene with a sheet over our bodies to keep the rating PG-13.