WHY DO PEOPLE WANNA FALL IN LOVE?

In 1999, I watched the film THE MIRROR HAS TWO FACES and found myself rewinding the VHS tape on a particular classroom scene which caught my romantic ears' attention. Sharpening my skills at Gregg's shorthand anew, I transcribed the portion which attempts to answer the question above.

Am I buying it? Nah.




ROSE'S CLASSROOM SCENE
THE MIRROR HAS TWO FACES


Rose:
So this is the scene at my sister's wedding, right? There she is getting drunk, regretting she ever got married for the third time, mind you. And my mother is so jealous she is sprawling snakes from her hair. And I am thinking, this is perfect. We've got three feminine archetypes here. The divine whore, excuse me. Medusa. And me. Who am I? What archetype? Trevor?

Trevor:
Virgin Mary?

Rose:
Thanks a lot, Trevor. No! The faithful handmaiden. Always the bridesmaid, never the bride. It does prove however what Jung said all along. That myths and archetypes are alive and well and living in my apartment. As I stood at the altar beside my sister and her husband-to-be, it struck me that this ritual called a wedding ceremony is really just the final scene of a fairy tale. They never tell you what happens after. They never tell you that Cinderella drove the Prince crazy with her obsessive need to clean the castle. That she missed her day job. Right. Now, they don't tell us what happens after because there is no after. The be-all and the end-all of romantic love was ... Mike?

Mike:
Sex?

Rose:
Mike ... Mike ... Mike. Sex ... on the brain, Mike. Right? Yes?

Student 1:
Marriage?

Rose:
Marriage, that's right. But it wasn't always like that. Around the 12th century, there was a notion known as courtly love where a love had nothing to do with marriage and nothing to do with sex. In most cases, it was defined as a passionate relationship between a knight and a lady of the court who was already married. And so they could never consummate their love. In this way, they would have to rise above your ordinary, ah, you know, going-to-the-bathroom-in-front-of-each other kind of love, right. And they would go after something more divine. They took sex out of the equation and what was left was a union of souls. Now, think of this. Sex was always the fatal love potion. Look at the literature of the time. Lancelot and Guinevere. Tristan and Isolde. All consummations could lead to was madness, despair, or death. Clinical experts follow that with my Aunt Esther, are united in the belief that true love has spiritual dimensions while romantic love is nothing but a lie, an illusion, a modern myth, a soullist manipulation. Speaking of manipulation, it's like going to the movies and we see the lovers onscreen kiss, and the music swells and we buy it, right? So when my date takes me home and kisses me goodnight, if I don't hear the Philharmonic in my head, I dump him. Now the question is, why do we buy it? We buy it because whether it's a myth or a manipulation, let's face it, we all want to fall in love, right? Why? Because that experience makes us feel completely alive. Where every sense is heightened, every emotion is magnified, our everyday reality is, is shattered and we are flung into the heavens. It may only lasts a moment, an hour, an afternoon, but that doesn't diminish its value. Because we are left with memories that we treasure for the rest of our lives. I read an article a while ago that said when we fall in love we hear Puccini in our heads. I love that. I think it is because his music fully expresses our longing for passion in our lives. And, and romantic love. And while we're listening to Love Away (?) or Turindot, or reading Wuthering Heights or watching Casablanca, a little bit of that love lives in us too. So, the final question is, why do people wanna fall in love when you can have such a short shelf-life and be devastatingly painful? What do you think? Stacey?

Stacey:
It leads to propagation of the specie?

Rose:
Hmm. Bren.

Bren:
Psychologically, we need to connect with somebody.

Rose:
Could be. Jill?

Jill:
Because we're culturally preconditioned?

Rose:
Good answers but much too intellectual for me. I think it's because, as some of you already may know, while it does last, it feels fucking great! That's why. Right?