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.
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
ReplyDeleteI am only sorry you never got to dance in full formal, like Fred Astaire! Margo
ReplyDeleteI really enjoy your journal!!
ReplyDeleteWow...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.
ReplyDeleteChuck,
ReplyDeleteBoth 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.
ReplyDeleteThink I'll rent Shall We Dance and imagine it with very tall people.
Mrs. L
I loved this movie too.
ReplyDeleteI love the 65 year old Protagonist with the 25 year old hardbody Latin supermodel.
ReplyDelete