Just finished watching “Love Story†for the first time since I was thirteen.
When I was thirteen, it’s not that I didn’t have taste…well, no, that’s not true. But I at least already suspected this was so, and I remember being torn over the fact I liked “Love Storyâ€. I remember, just a mere thirty minutes after seeing the film, my face by now dried of tears, getting home and walking into the dining room, and as I faced my mother’s parlor grand piano, in the dull yellow light of that suburban dining room, standing between the faux walnut Formica dining table and the piano, gazing at the piano, a deep suspicion rose that, not only had I betrayed years of training in classical music by loving the musical score of “Love Story†but that there were many good reasons why I should not have liked the movie. And I was determined that very, very soon I should really really understand why.
I remember being puzzled, even then, over how weirdly squeaky clean it was. Even bland in its devotion to middle class reluctance to face anything remotely real world. I remember feeling cheated by this, that it didn’t even give a nod to the Vietnam War, to the struggle for Civil Rights, to hippies, to ANYTHING. And Ali McGraw didn’t dress like any college student I’d ever seen.
Since I was about fourteen I have really really understood how “Love Story” is a bad movie, but I never tested this understanding with a second viewing. For all I knew, despite it being a bad movie, I might choke up anyway and break down in tears.
Tonight, I watched the movie for the first time since I was thirteen.
As Ali and Ryan cavorted in the snow (there is much cavorting in the snow) I mused that Snow should have been given credit in a supporting role.
When Ryan said to Ray Milland, “Father, you don’t know the time of day!” I thought Ray Milland’s expression appropriately displayed confusion over what exactly that is supposed to mean.
When Ali saw the apartment in which they would be living while the disinherited Ryan went through law school, and she said that she hadn’t realized it would be THAT bad, I thought, “WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU? THAT’S A GREAT PLACE!”
When the disinherited Ryan tried to get a scholarship to go to school and spoke of himself as being impoverished, I yawned.
As the disinherited Ryan struggled through law school, selling Christmas trees, disappointed by quarter tips, and Ali struggled to support him with a $3000 a year teaching gig, and they still drove around in the antique convertible Bentley (or whatever it was) and they managed to dress straight out of the pages of 70s Vogue throughout, I didn’t laugh, I just thought, “Oh, seriously,” and, “She had great legs. That’s what made this movie so popular. Those legs in those black stockings going up and down all those steps over and over again.”
When Ali said to Ryan, “Love means never having to say you’re sorry,” I thought even Ali didn’t look quite convinced.
The doctor told Ryan that Ali was dying and I was dry-eyed.
Then, as Ali in her white coat and ostentatious fur hat stumbled through the snow, supported by Ryan O’Neal, after asking if they had enough money for a taxi and he said yes, where did she want to go, and she replied, “To the hospital”, after her having watched him do his hockey weaves and bobs on the ice one last time, I laughed out loud. They kept walking on through the snow and I kept laughing at them and the hat. That hat.
There were tears in my eyes, but they were because I was laughing at the hat.
Then came the scenes with Ali in the hospital, straight out of day time soap operas.
Worse than bad.
It was all so soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo worse than just plain bad.
Yes, I know a lot of money was made on that movie and all involved would feel no regrets because a lot of money was made on it. Still, if I had been the director, the rest of my life I would have spent hiding in the shadows from that scene of Ali in THAT BIG FUZZY CREATURE OF A FUR HAT supported by Ryan as they walk through the snow to the taxi and she jokingly (I think) asking if they have enough money for a taxi, now that they have some lawyer money after years of supposed student poverty, DURING WHICH THEY DROVE AROUND IN A BENTLEY! Or, I think it was a Bentley.
And if Ali had been asking, in all seriousness, if they had the money for a taxi?
Rerun.
Ali (in pristine white innocent white expensive white clothes and big huge fur hat): “Do we have enough money for a taxi?”
There, instant depth to the film. Had she been serious.
Surely, Arthur Hiller is haunted by that hat.
P.S. C’mon. What’s your gut emotional reaction to a man whining about needing a scholarship, driving around in a big old antique convertible Bentley, and selling Christmas trees for cash? Wasn’t this released as a comedy and somehow America got it all wrong and thought it was tragedy and cried? What does it say about us as a people that hordes of Americans sobbed piteously instead of getting the joke?
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