Music and lyrics

I watched a romantic comedy last night. Films are so predictable aren't they.

An action film... like Rambo.. Die Hard etc... The hero has an incredible task to stop bad guy doing bad stuff, and it all depends on him. He begins to tackle the job and it only gets tougher. Somewhere the hero gets beaten up and ends up in a bad situation. .. Usually with a makeshift bandage over a bleeding wound and his clothing torn and a bare chest showing.... But hero overcomes the odds, and in spite of many many bad guys against him, (or her these days) manages to beat the crap out of bad guys and saves the day with an "only doing my job" shrug of his/her shoulders. Sometimes he even gets the gorgeous girl with whom he has been arguing and protecting all film long.

Romantic or romantic comedy film. (We watched "Music and Lyrics" with Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore in it) Man and woman meet in unlikely circumstances and often an unlikely couple (e.g. "Pretty Woman" ... Prostitute & Business tycoon... Another Hugh Grant film with Julie Roberts- famous actress with secondhand bookshop owner etc.) They seem to have chemistry and the relationship begins to blossom. She makes a stand on some principle, they begin arguing and tension develops. Then usually the man says something stupid. (Obviously men are stupid in chic flicks!) and they split up. Then there are sequences where each is alone aching for the other, obviously hurt. The last scenes of the film the man in some way returns to her and apologises for his stupidity and they end up in a rapturous lip-bruising kiss. (Gere brought balloons to Julie Roberts in "Pretty Woman".. last night Hugh Grant created and sung a sloppy "give me another chance" song.) The thing is that basically they are all the same! As soon as I saw the girl come to the door of Hugh Grant's apartment to water the plants last night I knew the story line! Can't the writers get more imaginative? Basically its the Cinderella story retold in different guises. Why? And why do we keep watching them?

I guess one reason is that in real life we often find that love happens in funny places with the people we least expect, and this basic story line reminds us of those experiences.

Music and lyrics...sex and relationships. One of the key lines in the film last night interested me. The couple were working on creating a song together. He created the music, she was the lyricist. He claimed the music was all important. She argued that the lyrics were just as important. In stating her case she said, "It is like relationships. First there is the sexual attraction and the sex. That's the music. Then, if all goes well there is the relationship and talking, where you get to know each other. That's the lyrics."  Of course by the end of the film this lucky couple had the music and the lyrics. But I found the order in which she placed things interesting. First the sex, then getting to know each other. It reminded me of a documentary where they were interviewing young women clubbers in NZ. They had the same order of things. You pick someone up at the a club, have sex and if that goes alright then you build a relationship. It does not ring bells with me.

Now I am not an expert in these matters. I was nicknamed the "Bull Virgin" before I was married, so I have not had sex partners, so some would say I have little experience to speak from.  I "saved myself" for marriage, though some interesting, exciting and valuable "exploration and learning" took place between my girlfriend/fiance and I. (I am thankful for that because the lessons learned in exploration actually help lead to a creative sex life in marriage. Also I am forever thankful that we became good friends and had a good level of intimacy in terms of ability to talk openly with each other, before we became lovers.) It was the way it was for good little Christian girls and boys in those days. Perhaps with a broader perspective if I was young these days I may be more adventurous. But... even if I was young and more adventurous I still think that the best way around is for the physical intimacy to grow out of the intimacy of relating and knowing one another. It seems to me to be the right way around. When I have been talking to youth groups and young people about such things I have always said that whatever physical relationship we choose to have needs to be commensurate with the level of intimacy of the talking- sharing-knowing each other side of the relationship. I recall one relatively liberal thinking sex expert in a book writing sentences that said such things as; "If you can't talk freely about contraception, should you be having sex in the first place?" and again, "If you can't freely talk about the sorts of things you want to do and and have done to you while making love, should you be having sex with this person?"  So I disagree with the "music" coming before the "lyrics". Its the difference between "sex" and "making love". It seems healthier to me for intimacy of relating to come before physical intimacy.  I may be in-experienced and not be able to list off a stack of sexual partnerships, but I have seen a stack of hurt people, stifled lives and stuffed up relationships when the "music" has come first and the "lyrics" (true intimacy) has come later or perhaps never really happened.