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10 movies that would have been better
without the 'happily ever after'
By Martha Brockenbrough
Special to MSN Movies
Sixty-four years after it first came out, the nearly unanimous pick for most romantic film ever is "Casablanca."
"Casablanca." If this movie were a person, it'd be old enough to qualify for senior-citizen discount tickets at the multiplex. And yet, even as babies conceived in its aftermath have grown old and gray, no one's yet been able to craft a more enduring and compelling love story.
We have a theory why: The filmmakers were smart enough to skip the happily-ever-after part. Instead, Ilsa gets on the plane and escapes Nazi-controlled Casablanca. Rick starts a "beautiful" friendship with the police chief, in the pre-"Brokeback Mountain" era, when men could walk off into the sunset together without ever having to worry about quitting each other.
There are some movies, of course, that depict true love that we know will never, ever die. "The Princess Bride," "The Wedding Singer," "Shrek." All classics in their own right.
But for our money, more moviemakers should give us good break-ups. After all, it's better to have loved and lost than to be stuck with someone unsuitable, unstable or — egads! — boring.
As we prepare to see real-life couple Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn split on screen in "The Break-Up," here are 10 films we wish had ended with a break-up:
1. 'Say Anything' (1989)
The premise: Sincere guy wins heart of beautiful, smart girl.
The problem: Money. She's going to have financial hang-ups; he's going to be broke.
We love "Say Anything." Like many a minivan-driving mom, we're still waiting for the day a cute guy in a tan trench coat waits outside our window for a boom-box serenade.
Hopeless, yes. But so is the idea of Lloyd Dobler and Diane Court.
She's the class valedictorian headed off to a fancy-pants English university. Her dad, meanwhile, is headed to jail for embezzlement. Even with a scholarship, Diane's going to have some psychological issues around money and men.
Lloyd is an aspiring kickboxer. A talented one could bring in about $22,000 in 1989 dollars, if there was even a market for them in England.
After all, this wasn't a negotiable point. As he said himself, "I don't want to sell anything, buy anything or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought or processed, or repair anything sold, bought or processed. You know, as a career, I don't want to do that."
There is some hope, though. He described the very same business model that made many people his age dot-com millionaires. So, if he had the good sense to go to the Bay Area and join an Internet startup, he and Diane might have a shot.
2. 'Pretty Woman' (1990)
The premise: Cinderella is a hooker; Prince Charming is a ruthless businessman.
The problem: Skill in screwing other people is not a solid foundation for a relationship.
Julia Roberts and Richard Gere play Vivian and Edward in "Pretty Woman," which the producers intend as a modern-day Cinderella story. They even bake the notion into the dialogue.
"Tell me one person who it's worked out for," says Julia's hooker, Vivian. (You know a hooker has a heart of gold when she doesn't know when to say "whom.")
The answer? "Cinderf***inrella."
Here's the thing: Cinderella wasn't a hooker; she was an abused stepchild with really mean sisters. And the prince wasn't a callous businessman; he was looking for a girl who wasn't shallow.
And, even though Edward claims, "You and I are such similar creatures, Vivian. We both screw people for money," there is a big difference between selling your body because you have to and ruining other people's businesses because you want to.
Only in Hollywood do we root for couples in which the man is a huge jerk.
3. 'When Harry Met Sally' (1989)
The premise: Exploring a central question, "Can a man and a woman be friends without sex getting in the way?"
The problem: Harry and Sally aren't really friends.
It's hard to root for odious potential lovers who might someday become in-laws: the distant, gassy old-timer who can barely remember his grandchildren's names; the overbearing, impossible-to-please mother-in-law.
(Excuse us. We need a moment.)
OK, we're back.
Harry is disrespectful and dismissive. He thinks Sally wants to be a gymnast, not a journalist. He mocks her sexual history. And his line, "I love that you take an hour-and-a-half to order a sandwich" is one of the least believable ever uttered on film. That sort of menu-paralysis would drive a sane person, or anyone with slightly hypoglycemic tendencies, to homicide.
And let's not get started on Sally. What sort of head-case needs 90 minutes to order food? Who thinks it's OK to request endless substitutions at restaurants?
The movie that mainstreamed the phrase "high-maintenance woman" owes it to reality to deprive Sally of love permanently. Only then will the fussbudget gene pool — and Meg Ryan's wrinkle-nosed movie career — dry up.
4. 'The African Queen' (1951)
The premise: Opposites attract in the jungle as a spinsterish English missionary hires a salty boat captain to avenge her brother's death.
The problem: In the long run, opposites repel.
Katharine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart are arguably the potato chips of the thespian world. Can anyone get enough? Yet even potato chips sometimes need a little something to wash them down, and the beverage dispenser on the African Queen is unfortunately out of coconut juice.
Director John Huston knew on some level there was a problem with the idea of a salty, well-used sailor enjoying lasting love with a "crazy, psalm-singing skinny old maid." (Just what every woman wants to hear a man say about her.)
Huston reportedly considered hanging the lovers instead of rescuing them with a well-timed torpedo immediately after their impromptu, Nazi-hosted execution/wedding.
The hanging would have been more believable, and it would have spared us from imagining their inevitable breakup once they swim to shore and try to set up a household with space for his booze and her Bibles.
5. 'Jerry Maguire' (1996)
The premise: A sports agent develops a conscience, loses his job, but finds true love.
The problem: It's a lot more like "true like" than true love.
Maybe if Jerry Maguire had featured a couch-jumping scene with Oprah, swiftly followed by a pregnancy, the relationship between Tom Cruise's passionate sports agent and Renée Zellweger's adorable Dorothy would have seemed more plausible.
But it's an obvious disaster in the making.
For starters, they're the only employees of a failing business. They couldn't put any more eggs in a single basket if they were using it to tote around a very fertile hen. What's more, the timing is bad. Not only is he on the rebound, personally and professionally, she's drenched in eau de desperate cologne.
As she tells her sister, "I've had three lovers in the past four years, and they all ran a distant second to a good book and a warm bath."
The bizarre thing about this movie is, even the characters know their love is doomed. Dorothy herself says, "I have this great guy. And he loves my son. And he sure does like me a lot."
The movie's final scene is the clincher. It's meant to show a promising future. The darling little snickelpuss Ray — who's walking between his mom and Jerry — turns out to have an outstanding throwing arm.
The scene shows the future all right. The kid and their different ambitions will prevent their relationship from going the full nine yards. They should have just concluded that moment was the start of a very beautiful athlete-agent relationship, and called it a day.
6. 'The Graduate' (1967)
The premise: A college track star has an affair with an older woman and falls for her daughter.
The problem: A college track star has an affair with an older woman and falls for her daughter.
"The Graduate" is almost 40 years old, making it perhaps the lovechild of "Casablanca." And as much as our moral standards have allegedly relaxed in that time, the idea of having a successful long-term relationship with the daughter of your lover still doesn't fly. (Sorry, Woody Allen.)
Yes, Benjamin rescued Elaine from what would have been a doomed marriage. And yes, it was lovely to see them ride off into the sunset on a bus, looking happy to have escaped the oppression of the upper-middle class and its plastic-laden future.
But can love really conquer all? We don't think so. Imagine the holiday dinner scenes. Mrs. Robinson sits across the table, offering Benjamin turkey. "What'll it be? Breasts? Or thighs?"
Love would have to be blind, deaf and truly dumb to want to endure that.
7. 'My Fair Lady' (1967)
The premise: A snooty bachelor professor promises he can pass a guttersnipe off as a high-society girl with six months' training.
The problem: That he'd make a bet like that.
Never mind that Rex Harrison won an Oscar for his portrayal of Professor Higgins in this 1967 classic. Picturing him with Audrey Hepburn is like looking at a beautiful dove wearing tasseled loafers. It makes no sense. She'd be better off without him.
The main problem? His character is a jerk — and Eliza knows she's worth better (and even says as much to his mother).
Professor Higgins calls Eliza "deliciously low" and "horribly dirty." He asks, "Why can't a woman be more like a man?" Even when he sees her for the lovely person she is, the best line he can come up with is that he's "grown accustomed to her face."
Yes, Higgins' banter is supposed to be funny. But in the real world, it isn't, and men like him generally deserve their fate: eating a 5 p.m. bowl of barley soup at a cozy table for one.
8. 'Four Weddings and a Funeral' (1994)
The premise: A commitment-phobic Brit meets a fetching American divorcee, falls in love and doesn't marry her.
The problem: The idea of not marrying her is supposed to be romantic.
Back before he was caught in the company of a prostitute, Hugh Grant used to play a lovable, bumbling Englishman with a speech impediment. Post-prostitute, he seems to be a stutter-free scoundrel. We prefer the later version; at least we don't have to pretend the man's going to have a successful relationship.
In "Four Weddings," Grant plays a stutterer named Charles, who happens to be a royal mess. Not only does he abandon his fiancée at the altar, he also overlooks his obvious love match, the witty and adoring Fiona, played by Kristin Scott Thomas.
Instead, he pursues a dull American named Carrie, played by Andie McDowell, whose chief attraction appears to be her big, black hat. And instead of marrying Carrie, even when he "thinks" he loves her, the two agree to be not married.
That's true love? Yes, and the prostitute was just giving Grant speech therapy.
9. 'The Little Mermaid' (1989)
The premise: A mermaid who wants to be human gives up her voice for the man she loves.
The problem: Location, location, location.
In the Hans Christian Anderson version of the story on which this Disney movie is based, the Little Mermaid does not end up with the prince, who marries someone else. Instead, she ends up with a knife in her hand, and an invitation to stab him (which she declines).
Hans Christian Anderson knew the relationship would never work. And while Anderson cast the story as a love triangle, the real problem was one the oft-married Donald Trump would understand: location, location, location.
How could a mermaid ever be happy being married to the ruler of a seaside kingdom? It would be only a matter of time before he started eating her friends. That's the sort of thing that would rub a girl's scales the wrong way, and quickly.
10. 'Sixteen Candles' (1984)
The premise: A girl's family forgets her 16th birthday, which turns out to be unforgettably romantic.
The problem: Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, male-friendly lesbians (thanks, "Chasing Amy").
Molly Ringwald, in her heyday, stars as 16-year-old Samantha Baker, the overlooked middle child in a family otherwise preoccupied with her older sister's marriage to a mobster.
We know Samantha has a good heart because she's willing to give her panties to a total geek. We also know she has a crush on a hot senior she's never spoken to, primarily because he's got deadly handsome eyebrows and a totally ausgezeichnet Porsche.
That's all normal enough, especially for an '80s movie. Nonetheless, their love is doomed because the hot senior wants something else. As Jake tells the geek, "I want a serious girlfriend. Somebody I can love ... that's gonna love me back. Is that psycho?"
No, of course not. But, like Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and male-friendly lesbians (kidding!), that sort of high-school-aged boy doesn't exist. At least, not trapped inside the body of a Calvin Klein model.
And even if he did, a girl who liked him primarily for his looks would only break his heart. We, on the other hand, appreciated Jake Ryan for his mind. Jake, let's do lunch. Call us!
Martha Brockenbrough, author of "It Could Happen to You: Diary of a Pregnancy and Beyond," hasn't broken up with anyone in 10 years.
Red heads ROCK. Blondes do not rock. Nuff said.
