Why Women Love Romantic Comedies
Okie I saw this article which really struck me as interesting... why? Coz I'm also in love withromantic comedies... haha... oops...
Slack
By Shaun Goh:
Asking women why they like romantic comedies is as good as asking men why they live and breathe soccer. You just can’t. It is one of those truly inexplicable gender things that would have sociologists and psychologists up in arms against each other in their attempts to assert theoretical dominance by explicating such behaviour in purely social and biological terms respectively. That said, and heavy academia aside, I shall now attempt to explore possible and hopefully, plausible, explanations for such a generalization.
In essence, people watch movies to be entertained. But entertainment is subjective in nature and what constitutes entertainment to some may be pure drudgery to others. Hence, a better question to ask would then be "why more women like romantic comedies more so than men", since the previous question carries with it the assumption that all women are somewhat enigmatically drawn to romantic comedies.
Assuming also that women are indeed more sensitive emotionally than their male counterparts, it is not difficult to see why romantic comedies seem to appeal to a primarily female rather than male audience. Combining the elements of humour and love and straddling the genres of comedy and romance, such movies are essentially feel-good extravaganzas that leave you feeling satisfied, contented and perhaps even downright mushy inside. This is not to say however that men are inherently emotionless androids with an aversion to, simply put, feeling good. Instead, it is an unequal definition of the term that results in a disparity between preferences since the elicitation of similar emotions may have a different impact on the differing genders. Hence, while feelings and notions revolving primarily around love and romance may appeal to the female gender, excitement, suspense and adventure may have the same effect on men instead. In this way, it may be suggested that more women like romantic comedies more so than men primarily because they are more in tune with their feelings than men are and the emotions these movies evoke appeal more so to their sense of feel-good than to men’s.
What’s more, movies are a form of escapism. A time when one is allowed to momentarily abandon reality and be transported into another dimension, and a time when one is called upon to identify with certain onscreen situations and characters. It is, simply put, an opiate of temporal anesthetic effect. A visual and auditory indulgence that encourages viewers to suspend all notion of reality and to engage in an oft fictional or sensationalized account of events instead. In this way, romantic comedies allow women: both single and attached, to luxuriate shamelessly in a milieu of endless romantic possibilities. Giving them opportunity after opportunity to empathize with the story’s female protagonist: Causing them to applaud her sense of independence in the initial stages of her scripted single-hood and to sigh in both contentment and satisfaction at the sight of an ending that is oh-so-happy-ever-after.
But more than being just entertainingly escapist, movies also embody an element of fantasy. They reflect, enact, and articulate the otherwise unrealized desires and aspirations of many, thereby creating a sense of community in which individuals are inherently linked to each other through a communal form of expression. In this way, romantic comedies give fuel to a woman’s sense of hope. Hope that they too may one day be swept off their feet by a handsome prince charming. Hope that they too may find humour and true love in a world of meaningless toil and woe. Hope that somewhere out there in the vast sea of countless fishes, is a soul-mate, the one and only person that they would eventually grow old and happy with.
Men on the other hand, seem to place unrivalled emphasis on power and all its various forms: Money, fast cars, physical mutations and technological superiority. Hence the relatively larger appeal of testosterone-filled movies like X-Men 3, Tokyo Drift, and Torque to men is of no mysterious coincidence at all. The equation in this case is fairly simple: Gadgets + Explosions + Speed + Action = A Summer Blockbuster…And oh, let’s not forget the curvaceous, drool-worthy bombshell that male audiences get to ogle as well. In comparison, romantic comedies offer little more than the pretty face of a female actress to keep male viewers continuously captivated for the entire duration of the film. Sure, it may incite a few chortles every now and then but the experience is far from the titillating journey that thrillers and action flicks bring their audiences on. It is a relatively low-budget experience in every sense of the word but only, of course, in terms of men’s definition of "entertainment". Uncreative, predictable, mundane and even arduous, romantic comedies do nothing for men in terms of existing relationships other than to act as a reminder of their incompetence and romantic inadequacies. But before you ladies go nodding in agreement at real men’s seeming lack of sentimentality, it is crucial to realize that while fairytales do exist, they are realized more often than not in reel, not real, life. Simply put: If you really did think that that actor prepared that bonfire on the beach all by himself, you deserve a good smack on the head.
In conclusion, while the appreciation of different genres cannot be defined purely in terms of gender, it is possible and even plausible to state that more women like romantic comedies more so than men due to differing conceptualizations of the term entertainment and the importance that each gender tends to place on the different qualities of love, humour, excitement, adventure, and power.
Slack
By Shaun Goh:
Asking women why they like romantic comedies is as good as asking men why they live and breathe soccer. You just can’t. It is one of those truly inexplicable gender things that would have sociologists and psychologists up in arms against each other in their attempts to assert theoretical dominance by explicating such behaviour in purely social and biological terms respectively. That said, and heavy academia aside, I shall now attempt to explore possible and hopefully, plausible, explanations for such a generalization.
In essence, people watch movies to be entertained. But entertainment is subjective in nature and what constitutes entertainment to some may be pure drudgery to others. Hence, a better question to ask would then be "why more women like romantic comedies more so than men", since the previous question carries with it the assumption that all women are somewhat enigmatically drawn to romantic comedies.
Assuming also that women are indeed more sensitive emotionally than their male counterparts, it is not difficult to see why romantic comedies seem to appeal to a primarily female rather than male audience. Combining the elements of humour and love and straddling the genres of comedy and romance, such movies are essentially feel-good extravaganzas that leave you feeling satisfied, contented and perhaps even downright mushy inside. This is not to say however that men are inherently emotionless androids with an aversion to, simply put, feeling good. Instead, it is an unequal definition of the term that results in a disparity between preferences since the elicitation of similar emotions may have a different impact on the differing genders. Hence, while feelings and notions revolving primarily around love and romance may appeal to the female gender, excitement, suspense and adventure may have the same effect on men instead. In this way, it may be suggested that more women like romantic comedies more so than men primarily because they are more in tune with their feelings than men are and the emotions these movies evoke appeal more so to their sense of feel-good than to men’s.
What’s more, movies are a form of escapism. A time when one is allowed to momentarily abandon reality and be transported into another dimension, and a time when one is called upon to identify with certain onscreen situations and characters. It is, simply put, an opiate of temporal anesthetic effect. A visual and auditory indulgence that encourages viewers to suspend all notion of reality and to engage in an oft fictional or sensationalized account of events instead. In this way, romantic comedies allow women: both single and attached, to luxuriate shamelessly in a milieu of endless romantic possibilities. Giving them opportunity after opportunity to empathize with the story’s female protagonist: Causing them to applaud her sense of independence in the initial stages of her scripted single-hood and to sigh in both contentment and satisfaction at the sight of an ending that is oh-so-happy-ever-after.
But more than being just entertainingly escapist, movies also embody an element of fantasy. They reflect, enact, and articulate the otherwise unrealized desires and aspirations of many, thereby creating a sense of community in which individuals are inherently linked to each other through a communal form of expression. In this way, romantic comedies give fuel to a woman’s sense of hope. Hope that they too may one day be swept off their feet by a handsome prince charming. Hope that they too may find humour and true love in a world of meaningless toil and woe. Hope that somewhere out there in the vast sea of countless fishes, is a soul-mate, the one and only person that they would eventually grow old and happy with.
Men on the other hand, seem to place unrivalled emphasis on power and all its various forms: Money, fast cars, physical mutations and technological superiority. Hence the relatively larger appeal of testosterone-filled movies like X-Men 3, Tokyo Drift, and Torque to men is of no mysterious coincidence at all. The equation in this case is fairly simple: Gadgets + Explosions + Speed + Action = A Summer Blockbuster…And oh, let’s not forget the curvaceous, drool-worthy bombshell that male audiences get to ogle as well. In comparison, romantic comedies offer little more than the pretty face of a female actress to keep male viewers continuously captivated for the entire duration of the film. Sure, it may incite a few chortles every now and then but the experience is far from the titillating journey that thrillers and action flicks bring their audiences on. It is a relatively low-budget experience in every sense of the word but only, of course, in terms of men’s definition of "entertainment". Uncreative, predictable, mundane and even arduous, romantic comedies do nothing for men in terms of existing relationships other than to act as a reminder of their incompetence and romantic inadequacies. But before you ladies go nodding in agreement at real men’s seeming lack of sentimentality, it is crucial to realize that while fairytales do exist, they are realized more often than not in reel, not real, life. Simply put: If you really did think that that actor prepared that bonfire on the beach all by himself, you deserve a good smack on the head.
In conclusion, while the appreciation of different genres cannot be defined purely in terms of gender, it is possible and even plausible to state that more women like romantic comedies more so than men due to differing conceptualizations of the term entertainment and the importance that each gender tends to place on the different qualities of love, humour, excitement, adventure, and power.
posted by Hansen at 1:21 AM
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