Shall We Dance, 2004, with Richard Gere, Susan Sarandon, and Jennifer Lopez, astounded me. I thought I would hate it. A businessman has a mid-life crisis -- so who cares. And he solves it by learning to ballroom dance -- oh, come on.
But it is fascinating, yes, even the dancing. It reminded me that I was a good dancer, once, in high school, before W.W.II. I even had the ambition to at some time in my life, go to a dance in full formal, not just tux, full formal tails, pure white, like Fred Astaire. (That's laughable now, but back then, well...)
Susan has a line that brought me up short, woke me up. She says, "We each need a witness to our lives." We need someone to watch our successes and crises. Wow, I thought, that's why we pair off in daily lives and online. We need someone to be a witness to the things we are proud of, and even the pains we bear. How come I hadn't thought of that before?
Oh, and Jennifer Lopez wears a dress in the last scene that rivals the one that brought her to our attention at the Oscars or Emmys a few years back, the one that made Time and AOL pages. And little J-Lo can act with the likes of Gere and Sarandon.
A happy surprise on a Saturday afternoon.
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8 comments:
I loved to dance and I got quite good at it. Not sure I could even hold my balance anymore. Sometime I am sorry I let someone take it away from me. Paula
I am only sorry you never got to dance in full formal, like Fred Astaire! Margo
I really enjoy your journal!!
Wow...exactly! That was my favorite line of the movie, too. It changed the way I look at everyone in my life. Everything else you said, too, I felt just the same way about that movie. By the way, I have enjoyed witnessing your journaling life for several months now. Sometimes I laugh out loud, sometimes I feel like crying, other times I don't know what you're talking about, or else I disagree completely. But it's always an interesting read. Keep it up.
Chuck,
Both my wife and I enjoyed Shall We Dance. It's not an Oscar-caliber performance, but a nice, solid bit of story telling that held our attention despite all the myriad demands life makes on us.
While I never had the opportunity to do the white tails, I did do full "black tie and tails" on several occasions back in the '60's at the Debutante balls in NYC. It was a blast...
wil
http://journals.aol.com/hewasolddog299/snoozeII/
After three years at Mrs. Woolson's Ballroom Dancing School in junior high, I longed to waltz with someone I didn't tower over. As I grew to six feet tall in high school, that didn't seem to be a remote possibility. Luckily by the time I graduated, we were doing the twist and for the next umpteen years everybody danced apart. Until my 30th college reunion. An old classmate asked if I wanted to do some latin dance I didn't know. Don't worry, he said. Just follow me. It was great. Finally, I could follow effortlessly and even feel graceful. Why? A former basketball player, he was seven feet tall.
Think I'll rent Shall We Dance and imagine it with very tall people.
Mrs. L
I loved this movie too.
I love the 65 year old Protagonist with the 25 year old hardbody Latin supermodel.
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