Making The Movies Jealous

By Dan

If you haven't seen the video entitled "Making The Movies Jealous" it's worth the few minutes I think. It's right here if you're interested. If you don't want to take the time, it's basically a marriage proposal made through a homemade movie trailer. The young man conspired with his fiance's friends and the theater to have the trailer shown while she was there.

I wonder though if this is not a kind of a metaphor of the blurring of the lines between entertainment and real life. It's already impossible to know the extent to which our thinking is impacted by what we watch. What is the impact of these images that jerk us quickly from one scene or situation to another, one emotional state to another, and from one thought process to another; all to retain our increasingly prone-to-wander attention. This young couple will be learning soon enough that producing a clever marriage proposal is much easier than producing a wonderful marriage.

At last look this video had been viewed over 22 million times. I couldn't help but wonder how many older folks with a couple of decades under their belt felt about this. I wondered if they were perhaps a little nervous for this young couple, after such a public production of a proposal, on how they will fare as they encounter the thousandth episode of "We're Out Of Money Honey". The young man said that they would "make the movies jealous". They will soon learn in a very real way that their lives are nothing like the movies and that movies are nothing like life. For the young man to achieve his goal, at least as far as longevity is concerned, his marriage will need to last longer than 120 minutes.

Don't get me wrong. This article is not as much about this couple as it is about the blurring of the lines between entertainment and life. I was honestly impressed, not only for his cleverness, but by the fact that he asked the dad and the words he used when he asked. I sincerely hope that they do make the movies jealous with a marriage that becomes a beacon for marriage in a culture that doesn't seem to care very much about the institution any more.