Passionate Love and Popular Cinema

Romance and Film Genre

Erica Todd

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781137295378
• eBook ISBN: 9781137295385
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Film History & Criticism
• Index: Social Sciences

This book analyses the romantic drama and the way that passionate love is presented as the central storyline in popular cinema, drawing upon genre studies and sociology. Exploring the passionate love story as a cinematic form, it also contributes, through comparison, to research on the romantic comedy.

1

Passionate Love in Hollywood and the Romantic Drama Genre

While the romantic comedy depicts a popular form of love story, it is not the only romantic-focused genre that is produced in Hollywood and well-received by audiences. The genre has weak explanatory potential when examining love in Hollywood cinema as a whole, notwithstanding Mark Rubinfeld’s contention that ‘the Hollywood romantic comedy is currently the only popular Hollywood genre that focuses exclusively on romantic courtship and romantic love’.¹

Yet, at the time Rubinfeld’s research was conducted, Titanic (James Cameron, 1997) had recently been released, which was the top-grossing film ever made both domestically and internationally, a record it would hold for the next twelve years.² Despite the popularity of Titanic, a romantic drama with a passionate love story on which all other narrative action hangs, and well-regarded predecessors like Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942), Doctor Zhivago (David Lean, 1965) and Out of Africa (Sydney Pollack, 1985), there is a disparity in scholarship regarding the grouping of cinematic love stories that are not romantic comedies. Notable research in cinema studies outside the realm of the romantic comedy includes the work of: Laurent Jullier, who writes in a more personal style on classical-Hollywood films; Jean-Loup Bourget who looks at one decade (the 1940s) and has an emphasis on female stars; Catherine L. Preston, who focuses on the 1990s; and David R. Shumway, who perhaps has investigated the topic the most thoroughly but in the context of two classical Hollywood texts.³ Their research does not, however, significantly look at the romantic drama as a genre with a history or assess the role of ‘passionate love’.

Although passionate love is certainly not the sole or most significant type of love depicted on screen, romantic drama texts are still an essential component in the broad discussion of romance in cinema. By combining structural and cultural approaches to genre with sociological views of love the distinct qualities of the romantic drama genre emerge. Like any genre, there are variables within it; as Ralph Cohen notes, ‘even for Aristotle, generic markers are no absolutes’.⁴

There can be difficulties differentiating between films that are inflected with a passionate love story and films that are romantic dramas. Passionate love is considered to be extraordinary and exceptional; therefore, romantic dramas may attempt to avoid any hint of formula in a bid to highlight the uniqueness of the central couple’s love. There is a love story in the majority of Hollywood films and thus it can be hard to isolate those films that emphasise the romantic storyline. The passionate love story is identified mainly by its syntactic consistencies and therefore includes many hybrid films (even when romantic love and courtship are still the main focus and driving force of the narrative).

There are, however, a number of familiar qualities that define the romantic drama. The genre is essentially associated with two distinct temporal experiences. Passionate love is short-term, arising from idealistic conventions like ‘love at first sight’. The central protagonists encounter a strong, but fleeting, love and are torn apart by circumstances beyond their control (such as illness). Suffering emerges from dangers derived from elements of passion that sociologist Mike Featherstone isolates: ‘the irrationality of attraction, to the impossibility of sustaining love and the eventual price to be paid in the disruption of social relationships’.⁵ In Hollywood romantic dramas, however, the love is so intense that it lives on through memory, nostalgia and the symbols that remain as an effigy after the demise of the relationship. Flashbacks and voiceover narration are devices frequently used within romantic dramas, reinforcing the theme of memory, elongating the timeframe of the narrative and expanding the temporal boundaries.

Considering the Hollywood romantic drama

The label ‘romantic drama’ is an aspect that problematises analyses of passionate love stories. There are several reasons why the term takes prominence in this analysis. Firstly, these films stand in opposition to the romantic comedy and this label shows their relationship as romance genres, as well as their difference in tone. The romantic comedy is significant when analysing the romantic drama, as the two share a key narrative trope: the central element of a romantically involved, heteronormative couple. Many of the same social and cinematic incidents throughout filmic and social history, such as censorship regulations and the women’s movement, have affected them both. Similarly, the familiar romantic comedy can also provide a useful point of contrast when grouping passionate love stories. As Cohen remarks, ‘A genre does not exist independently; it arises in contrast with other genres, to compliment, augment, interrelate with other genres’.⁶

Secondly, when isolating popular films that have a more dramatic representation of love, but which are not romantic comedies, film scholars use a few different terms. Rubinfeld, simply calls them ‘romances’, as distinct from romantic comedies, while others, like John Mercer and Martin Shingler describe them as ‘romantic melodramas’.⁷ The small group of scholars that briefly discuss non-romantic comedies as part of a genre, however, like Bourget, James J. Dowd and Nicole R. Pallotta, and Preston, use the term ‘romantic drama’.⁸ This examination follows in their vein, employing the label ‘romantic drama’ for this alternate love story.

In popular articles and online material, ‘romantic drama’ is common in the lexicon of film categorisation, suggesting that audiences and popular critics recognise this label and are more interested in this group of films than scholars.⁹ Although Neale mentions ‘romantic drama’ sporadically throughout his examination of film genre, he does not provide a definition for it and has used the term ‘romantic melodrama’ in other research.¹⁰ Likewise, Deborah Thomas also interprets romance in the context of melodrama (and comedy).¹¹ In some ways, like tone and emotional appeal, the melodrama does inform the romantic drama; however, the romantic drama goes beyond one of the significant factors of the melodrama: that it is associated with women.¹² Although female viewers may be the biggest consumers of romantic dramas, the content of the films concerns men’s suffering as much as women’s grief.

Furthermore, familiar conventions related to passionate love occur throughout many Hollywood films, complicating any assessment of the romantic drama genre. Passionate love can have a small part in Hollywood texts, even those not generically classified ‘romances’. In Alfred Hitchcock’s classic, Psycho (1960), the heroine’s actions are driven by her passion for her boyfriend; in the final film of one of the most successful science fiction series, Star Wars: Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (George Lucas, 2005), passionate love motivates the hero’s sacrificial decision to abandon his beliefs to protect his wife from death. Even screwball and romantic comedies, which promote companionate love, include some elements of passion, evidenced through conventions like the use of verbal sparring. Moreover, any one of the many films that depict a sexual encounter shows, at the very least, a momentary glimpse of passion.

Beyond these minimal ‘tastes’ of passion are a group of films that are only inflected by a passionate love story. These texts can prove useful in reaffirming some of the conventions of the romantic drama, even though they do not fit within the genre. Shakespeare in Love (John Madden, 1998) falls under the historical comedy category, with the ‘tone’ of the romantic comedy in terms of the pacing; however, there are narrative elements that appear in the romantic drama genre, like the ultimate separation of the lovers as a result of social pressures as well as the importance of themes like memory and nostalgia.

Likewise, Now, Voyager (Irving Rapper, 1942) and The Horse Whisperer (Robert Redford, 1998) are both primarily maternal and family melodramas; yet they have a passionate love story as a secondary, subsidiary plot, where both couples have an intense, fleeting fling, but sacrifice their relationships for the wellbeing of children. In films like The African Queen (John Huston, 1951), the passionate love story is not the primary plot driver, although the exotic physical and temporal settings are traits that are recurrent in romantic dramas. As some scholars note, Films like An Affair to Remember (Leo McCarey, 1957), Annie Hall (Woody Allen, 1977) or Moonstruck (Norman Jewison, 1987) can further complicate the analysis of romance and genre in scholarship.¹³ They straddle romance genres as they employ conventions familiar to romantic comedies as well as elements related to passionate love, yet they are not romantic dramas.

Unlike films that are only inflected by passion, romantic dramas are recognisable for employing the passionate love story as the driving force of the narrative. Nevertheless, it is still difficult to identify the passionate love stories that are ‘romantic dramas’ as they lend themselves to hybridisation. There are many films that centre on the passionate love story of a couple, but use other generic elements to amplify the romantic plot. A unique passionate love story tends to be more successful and, by borrowing other generic conventions, these films are able to offer their audiences a courtship in more unusual circumstances. Casablanca and Titanic illustrate the success that can come with mobilising other plots (political thriller and historical disaster), which intensify the passion of the couple. Supernatural romantic dramas such as The Ghost and Mrs Muir (Joseph L. Mankewicz, 1947), Ghost (Jerry Zucker, 1990) and The Time Traveler’s Wife (Robert Schwentke, 2009) also surface frequently because they take the ‘ideal’ nature of passionate love to the extreme, depicting courtships that could never happen outside the realm of fantasy.

There are, additionally, more paradigmatic romantic dramas that are not hybrids. Although, as Janet Staiger contends, every film comprises elements of a variety of genres,¹⁴ these films have the passionate love story as the primary driver of the plot and all other generic plots as secondary (whereas in hybrids the passionate love story is equally important to other plots). The Bridges of Madison County (Clint Eastwood, 1995) has the family melodrama as a supporting plot and it is the passionate love story that predominates, while the gang plot is secondary to the passionate love story in China Girl (Abel Ferrara, 1987).

Finally, it ought to be noted that the woman’s film, with its interest in romance, poses particular problems with reg...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Introduction: Depicting Love in Cinema
• 1 Passionate Love in Hollywood and the Romantic Drama Genre
• 2 Passionate Love in Early Hollywood Romantic Dramas
• 3 Passionate Love in Hollywood Romantic Dramas 1950s–1970s
• 4 Passionate Love in Contemporary Hollywood Romantic Dramas
• Conclusion: The Changing Landscape of Passionate Love in Cinema
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Filmography
• Index