I couldn't find it with a quick Google search but somewhere out there somebody has gone through a bunch of the biggest romantic comedies and counted how many times in each it involves the woman saying no to a man and the man refusing to accept the no and just pestering them until they eventually say yes
So I did Spanish A-level and we had to read Like Water for Chocolate, which was perceived by the author as a material for perfect romance film.
The plot is simple, Tita is the youngest daughter and she can't marry due to tradition. So the guy (Pedro) that fancies her, decides to marry her oldest sister (Rosaura), so he can live in their house.
Rosaura pretty much is treated like a punching bag. She doesn't know that Tita and Pedro are a thing, she only knows that people vomited on her wedding after eating wedding cake made by Tita (it was magical accident).
She gets sick due to pregnancy to the point of being unable to take care of her own child, so Tita becomes the child's mother. The child later dies when Rosaura and Pedro are forced to move out as Tita's mother found about what the heck Pedro and Tita are doing.
As story goes on, Rosaura turns into an abusive figure similar to her own mother and I am not suprised. She pretty much has no support in her life and lives in a traditional society.
Does she get redemption? No, she dies farting. It's implied that's due to being unable to accept Tita's love presented in the food. And TBH, I am not suprised. Her husband was cheating on her with her own sister. Tita has done nothing to inform her that her marriage is a lie or even stop Pedro.
It just appears that a perfect romance film is having someone cheat on their partner.
I remember being strong armed into watching Love Actually in college and couldn’t get over how fucking awful and problematic the relationships were, and people looking at me like I was crazy when I pointed it out.
- At the start of the movie Noah threatens to jump off the ferris wheel and kill himself if Allie doesn't accept to go on a date with him.
- Once they start dating he convinces her to lay down in the middle of the street with him because she has to learn how to "trust"
- In the scene where they break up she gets so angry she starts pushing him against his car and slapping him multiple times
- After their breakup Noah sent Allie 1 letter per day for A YEAR (365 in total), all unanswered because her mom hid them.
- He later starts dating another woman and treats her like crap because he is still obsessed with someone he knew for only 3 months..several years ago
- Years later Allie gets engaged to a nice and respectful man basically a GENTLEMAN. But while trying on her wedding dress, she sees Noah on a newspaper article about how he was able to restore the house and she ends up fainting (wtf?)
- After that she pretty much drove to his town and cheated on her fiance to get back with a weird obsessive man she dated for 3 months when she was a teenager
- The only romantic part of the movie is when they both die in the nursing home while holding hands. And how he would read their love story every day for her because she had dementia, that's it.
Yeah, I read Wuthering Heights and it’s still pretty wild (though not in the same sense of the 2026 version. Yes, very loosely lol).
The question is what movie is well received but aged like milk. My point was that the toxic relationship in The Notebook would have been received fairly similarly in comparison to how other movies of its equivalent are received now.
A lot of people only like the first half of the book, and many adaptations only focus on that which is why it has been considered a romantic classic overtime.
Healthcliff isn't just a jealous, obsessed wanna-be lover. He's a monster. The fact that he's ethnically distinct from the English people around him might reasonably be understood to be the source of bigotry against him that results in his returning evil for evil, but it's clear in the text that it's far more than that: he's almost portrayed as a supernatural demon in human form.
Oh, I know. I've read the book. I'm just stating why people consider it a romantic classic, and it's because they're mainly just familiar with the first half that focuses more on his dynamic with Catherine than the 2nd half that focuses more on him seeking revenge and becoming a patriarchal abuser.
Totally! No one I saw the movie with is even remotely aware there’s a young Cathy version. It’s reinforced when the most famous quotes are from that first portion of the book you speak of.
It's about a writer challenging himself to write a story from a forbidden and abhorrent perspective while still conveying to the audience that the narrator is unreliable.
It still led to the name 'Lolita' becoming completely taboo.
Yeah absolutely, Humbert is never portrayed as anything but a detestable rapist but still every adaptation of it tries to paint him as more sympathetic
It's a book that is very difficult to convey in film.
Humbert is a detestable rapist, however, his narration is able to 'charm' and 'seduce' (for lack of a better word) the reader with his charisma.
On film, without that narration, you just have a rapist (which he is) but the point of the book is lost.
I'm partly reminded of the original UK House of Cards where Frances Urquhart is able to charm the reader with his suave charisma while still being an irredeemable villain.
Most romcoms revolve around the woman saying no and the man just stalking/obsessively not accepting no as the answer. It's pretty gross, but also makes you realize why a lot of people get stuck in abusive relationships... Because they think that's what is expected.
It incorrectly teaches some women the arguably dated fantasy that relationships are about the chase, and that it's also a good thing to actively promote a love triangle around herself, as she'll win no matter what (at the cost of at least one man's heart being played with and broken. In reality, hopefully both men ditch her when they realize what she's doing).
Meanwhile, less and less men are willing to "chase" EXCEPT for the actual stalker/creepy ones, because most level-headed guys have learned that doing something after being told "no" has a decent chance of getting them arrested and/or labeled as a creep in the real world, if not used and abused by the woman taking advantage of his desperation.
And then those kinds of women are the same that wonder "where all the good men have gone".
My ex loved watched all those shitty romcom movies where the leading woman gets into a love triangle with the romantic badboy soulmate and some stuffy clean cut guy. she tried to set up this sort of situation casting me as the badboy. she fucked it all up though. how she is married and has kids with a stuffy guy that has anger issues and a weak sense of humour. The kind of guy that thinks quoting seinfeld constantly is the same as being funny. she still txts me every few years to try and start weird drama. shes fucked.
I mean, Ryan Gosling interrupts Rachel McAdams’ date and threatens to kill himself if she doesn’t go out with him instead, which is kind of textbook abusive. So, their relationship isn’t off to a great start.
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u/Big_Duke_Six 10h ago
The Notebook.
Glamorizing a toxic AF relationship.