There was nothing preventing me from giving Herself the card, or from asking her out a dozen times, except my own nervousness. These feelings, combined with some recent time spent channel-flipping at home, have me thinking about obstacles in romantic comedies.
It's hard to believe, but before cell phones there was actually an entire subgenre of RC's in which the characters didn't meet until nearly the end of the film. The most famous is still Sleepless in Seattle, Nora Ephron's tale of a widower whose son's call to a radio talk show host attracts Meg Ryan from across the country. But I recently got reacquainted with a better example of the form, Brad Anderson's Next Stop Wonderland.
In this low-budget 1998 affair, Erin (the always welcome Hope Davis) gets dumped by her boyfriend (Philip Seymour Hoffman) in the opening scenes. Erin is down on love and looking for a change when her mother (Holland Taylor) places a personal ad on behalf of her daughter. (This somehow seems more believable than it did in Because I Said So)The ad attracts a mix of zany suitors, each with their own personality tic. Erin shows some spine when she realizes that three of her dates are actually colluding to get some voyeuristic thrills. She sets up a meeting at a restaurant and then watches from across the street when all three show up and there's no girl.
At that same encounter, Erin trades a lingering glance with Alan (Alan Gelfant). Alan's a plumber with ambition. He's taking classes in marine biology and volunteering at an aquarium. Alan's love life seems to consist mostly of fending off advances from a fellow student. (Cara Buono) Alan's character isn't quite as well developed as Erin's; his temperament runs towards serious though he causes an uproar by kidnapping the aquarium's star attraction.
I won't spoil the ending, but the meeting between Erin and Alan occurs with no more than 6 or 7 minutes left in the film. It's so arbitrary, open-ended, and potentially complicated that to me it feels exactly right. If someone ever made a sequel, it's possible that Erin and Alan wouldn't even be together anymore; that's how real and tenuous the connection feels.
Here's a quick comparison: In You've Got Mail, Meg Ryan unwittingly exchanges emails with Tom Hanks. Hanks is a corporate bigwig in a big-box bookstore chain, who shows up to annoy her when he's not busy putting her indie store out of business. The final meeting between Hanks and Ryan (who doesn't seem too bothered not to have a career) is a cliche-fest of dogs, Central Park, and generic New York rom-com music. Plot mechanics, anyone?
Screenwriters can come up with all the techno-obstacles they want, but there's nothing like deciding to open yourself up to another person a la Erin & Alan for drama. (The 40-Year Old Virgin may be the best recent studio example of this, oddly enough)So, put a card on someone's car, exchange anonymous emails, or talk to the cute stranger at the coffee shop. Don't forget to take the leap.
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