Crazy Stupid Soul Mates
The first hour and a half of Crazy Stupid Love reminds moviegoers that our romantic comedy palette need not be relegated to the sticky-sweet love story, which has become the template for Rom Coms that have dominated the box office over the last three decades. No, instead, the writers behind Crazy Stupid Love offer a refreshing take on marriage, dating, and relationships; it’s a narrative that we can all identify with, regardless of age or circumstance. That’s why the last two scenes are so much more deadly to watch.
The predominant storyline featuring Cal Weaver, played with an affable sweetness by every dad Steve Carrel, and Julianne Moore’s Emily Weaver, devolves at the very end into a syrupy mélange centering on “soul mates.” It’s the perfect ending for the couple that fell in love during grade school. Except, real life almost never works out that way, and audiences that have turned out to see the film this summer (it’s currently #54 on the Romantic Comedy box office chart after being out for 3 weeks) are implicitly made to believe that Cal and Emily, Jacob and Hannah (played by Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone), and even Cal’s son Robbie and their babysitter Jessica will live happily ever after. They’re soul mates, so they’ll make it. While this is a smart way to end a Romantic Comedy (it certainly satiated my inexplicable need for a happy ending), it’s also a detriment to men and women everywhere because it tricks us into believing this is how things happen.
Cal Weaver believes in a thing called “soul mates,” or so he says during the climactic scene in the movie:
I’m so mad at you. I’m really mad at you for what you did. But I’m mad at myself too. Because I should not have jumped out of that car - I should have fought for you. Because you fight for your soul mates.
There are problems with the idea of soul mates, but especially so in a movie Entertainment Weekly describes as “the best mainstream movie for adults this summer.” As an adult, there are certainly some things we can take away from this film (don’t cheat on your husband, Ryan Gosling is perfect—he’s even an arbiter of peace now, adults shouldn’t ever wear sneakers in public, avoid sipping the tiny straw in your drink, and don’t date “bland” guys), but the perseverance of self-described “soul-mates,” shouldn’t be one of them.
You can take a quiz to see if you and your partner are soul mates on teen advice, and the fact Cal gives his stirring speech at a middle school graduation ceremony is apt considering the rhetoric that closes this “adult” movie. The ethos behind the idea of soul mates is relegated to the adolescence from which it springs. It doesn’t stay there, because when the film ends, moviegoers are subconsciously assimilating the idea that ‘yes, our soul mate is somewhere out there right now.’
If you’re curious, the definition of soul mate according to dictionary.com is “a person with whom one has a strong affinity,” which makes it seem like a trivial designation; certainly not the transcendental application Cal Weaver applies in his enchanting speech. Most people aren’t so nonchalant about it’s use either. Soul mate is not a term one usually applies to standard relationships; it’s used more during a toast for someone’s 50th wedding anniversary, marriage vows (the first time around), or for paeans to Beatrice and Dante (even though they never spoke and married other people). I have a strong affinity to the poetry of Nicki Giovanni, but I wouldn’t say we’re soul mates. Often, soul mate is used ironically now to show the foolishness of young love. Merriam-Webster is a little more on-point with its definition as “a person that is perfectly suited to another in temperament.” Still lacks the luster we give it, doesn’t it?
We’ve all been in love, or thought we’ve been in love. We’ve all foolishly believed we’d found our soul mates. I was sure my high school girlfriend was my soul mate. Then I got to college, and I was sure the girl that kept looking at me on the bus was my soul mate etcetera etcetera ad infinitum. Over time you realize that’s just not how the world works, but then you see a movie like this, which pretends it’s showing you the real world when it’s really the same old fare, and the “soul mate” idea is back in your psyche. You want to believe your soul mate is out there.
The truth about relationships is much more complex than finding your true soul mate. Relationships are hard, and marriage is even harder. The writers for Crazy Stupid Love attempted to show how hard marriage can be, and through the first 95% of the film they were quite successful. But then they nose-dived at the end with the soul mate rhetoric. That’s what makes the Crazy Stupid Love of soul mates so terrible for the hormonally unbalanced teenagers that are seeing the film too. Those teenagers don’t have enough experience on their side to waft through the romantic BS. I’m sure there will be a series of incidents surrounding smitten teenage boys prowling the backyards of their teenage crushes (or to mirror the film, their babysitters). The world doesn’t condone that sort of behavior.
In real life, Cal wouldn’t have attempted to woo his ex-wife back with a sloppy romantic display at his 13 year-old son’s middle school graduation. Aside from the obvious embarrassment this would normally cause a young teenager, the Emily character probably would have called the police when she got home, then demanded and gotten a restraining order.
Cal’s obsessive behavior with Emily is meant to show his true affection for her, and when given an opportunity, the Emily character still cares for Cal. The main crux of the opening of the film is how blasé the routine of marriage becomes, which was the driving force behind Emily’s “cuckolding” of Cal with Kevin Bacon’s smarmy character, David Lindhagen. So why not go all in, and show that unhappily ever after happens? In fact—it happens more regularly than the gold at the end of the rainbow version we were served up.
There are a lot of people in the world, and maybe soul mates do exist, but the problem with the majority all romantic comedies that make money, even one’s that are as witty and endearing as Crazy Stupid Love, is they up the ante for relationships to an unrealistic standard. Most people loved this movie, I did too, but when they start it off with such a real-life problem like an unhappy marriage and divorce, then seek to tie that all together with the chimera that is soul mates, I can’t help but think we’re all worse off for watching it.
Now excuse me, I have to call my soul mate.
