It may sound ridiculous, but one of my favorite love stories of film is in The Fast and the Furious franchise. And it’s not pretty boy Paul Walker’s character Brian O’Connor and his little family-style romance with Mia. They actually annoy me a little. It’s Dom and Letty (Vin Diesel and Michelle Rodriguez) that make me swoon.
“I know everything about you,” Dom says, leaning into Letty as she’s backed up to the side of her car.
And that’s the hottest thing, isn’t it? Being known and still being loved so completely.
Want a panty dropper, date scene at the movies? Leap out of a speeding car on a bridge into the abyss of open air to catch your love as she hurdles to her death – not knowing that either of you will be saved – just knowing you have to catch her. Oh yeah, and she doesn’t remember you, and a she shot you in the shoulder earlier, but… you know her, and you love her, and you have a history…
Screw flowers and diamonds, Dom has grand romantic gestures on lock down.
Noooo, I’m not an adrenaline junkie. Not. At. All.
“How did you know that there would be a car there to break our fall?”
“I didn’t. Some things you just have to take on faith.”
Maybe that’s my problem. I swoon over movies like Fast 6. Literally, I swoon. Cars, racing, fight sequences, love that survives gun shot wounds and absences. Sheer will power and stubbornness. This is what romances me. These are the things that speak to my heart.
And yes, I’d let go and fall to my death just to take a shot at the douche bag trying to sneak up on my lover. And for that, I find Han and Gisele utterly romantic as well. What can I say? I’m a sucker.
Other favorites in movie history:
UP: The old man and Ellie. The first 15 minutes of that movie make me bawl like a baby. I love it. I’m living it. A romance born of childhood dreams and companionship.
Persuasion: Based on Jane Austen’s book. Another story of will power and waiting. Add to that Emma and you have the friendship and affection I sought out when I started dating my husband.
Tonight You’re Mine: This is probably one of the rare love stories I am into where the characters have not known each other half their lives. It’s epically reminiscent of my college years, minus the handcuffed to a super star, mind you. But the movie feels as much like home as 1327 does when I see it on screen. I’m not a speed demon criminal by a long shot, but Dom and I have very similar values. The ultimate romance is always one with your best friend and playmate. Just like Dom and Letty, who met at 15. Things like Titanic – that whole whirlwind of meeting that day and then feigning passionate love forever, never quite do it for it. It rings false every time. I remember seeing Titanic for the first time in the theatres and thinking, “She went on and had babies with someone else, why is she pretending he was the love of her life? He’s just someone she screwed on a boat. What a slut.” Tonight You’re Mine is the only whirlwind I can get behind… mostly because it was very Pride & Prejudice in nature, there was bickering before companionship, there was an established bond before love. That and there’s the mad rush of music.
My husband thinks I’m a little ridiculous. But if I had amnesia, I’d want there to be someone to fight for me. Someone to tell me where my scars came from. Someone to let me know its ok to be me, and that the me I was before was someone worth loving. And if there’s fast cars, a nostalgic house, stubborn wills, and music… all the better.
