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Wedding Essentials
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Of Love, Wedding, and Marriage Lessons we learn from the big screen
The Silver Screen provides us, viewers, a glimpse of reality - its triumphs and struggles. It is an excellent tool, a venue to show different interpretations of human relationships and emotions. We’ve seen it a countless time how people fall in love and fall out of love and while it may be true that love is blind, we must all agree that marriage is the eye-opener. Most of us, in one point of our lives, commit ourselves to believe in fairytales, “happily ever after”, and perfect on-screen married couples. While there are a lot of good films that talk about wedding and marriage, we’ve listed below some of the best films that celebrate the joys and pains of the “ever after” and its lessons that you and your partner may take note on your own marital journey. UP (2009) Who would have thought that a rich story about love and marriage is hidden in the 2009 animated movie about a flying house, a talking dog, and a pesky child? Beset with grief after losing his childhood sweetheart and partner for life Ellie, Carl decided to carry on Ellie’s memory to have an unexpected journey to South America to visit the Teipus Mountain in Venezuela with a young Wilderness Explorer named Russell. The lesson: The film is a sweet ode about the joy of sharing one’s life to another person regardless of the pains one endured and expectations that didn’t materialize. The quote: Thanks for the adventure. Now go have one of your own. Shall We Dance (2004) John Clark, a successful lawyer, begins to get bored with his perfect family life and decides to enroll himself in a dancing class with a beautiful dance instructor, which leads his wife to think that he is cheating on her. Due to the language of dance, the married couple has rekindled their love and affection to each other. The lesson: Complacency can kill the relationship. At one point of your married life, both of you might feel that life is routinary and boring and this may lead you or your partner search for happiness somewhere else. Always find ways to stay in touch together, bring back the feeling of excitement when both of you are just dating. The quote: We need a witness to our lives. There’s a billion people on the planet... I mean, what does any one life really mean? But in a marriage, you’re promising to care about everything. The Runaway Bride (1999) Maggie Carpenter is dubbed “The Runaway Bride” by the tabloid as she left three men in the altar on their wedding day all caught on tape. On the other hand, Ike Graham, a New Yorker reporter, makes an article about her and falls in love with her. Both of them are becoming more
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attracted to each other and Maggie realizes that she needs to face her fear. The lesson: Know yourself and be yourself. You don’t need to keep on reinventing yourself to fit your relationship. Marriage will not change who you are but will nourish you for the better. The quote: Look, I guarantee there’ll be tough times. I guarantee that at some point, one or both of us is gonna want to get out of this thing. But I also guarantee that if I don’t ask you to be mine, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life, because I know, in my heart, you’re the only one for me. My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002) The romantic- comedy film tells the story of Fotoula “Toula” Portokalos, a Greek-American woman who falls in love with a nonGreek school teacher Ian Miller. The wedding preparation becomes disastrous as the family of Toula incorporates Greek traditions to her wedding but still, turns out right in the end. The lesson: Our families and cultural traditions are all part of who we are even if they drive us crazy sometime. It is still best to share that special moment with the people that have loved us our entire lives. The quote: Don’t let your past dictate who you are, but let it be part of who you will become. Father of the Bride (1991) Played by Steve Martin, George Banks is having a difficult time of giving his daughter’s hand to marriage. From crazy wedding planners to prewedding disagreement, the film captures the stresses and joys of not only the couple but also of their parents as the big day approaches. The lesson: It will always be difficult for a Father to let her little girl get married. No matter how old you are or how self-sufficient you are, your father will always be protective of you. The quote: Who presents this woman? This woman? But she’s not a woman. She’s just a kid. And she’s leaving us.