Shirley Valentine
It is a fairly common prediction that everyone in our society goes through what is called a "midlife crises". A time of re-evaluation of the life one has led and a rebellion or abrupt change in life. To compensate for the banality of one's existence one takes a divergent step out of their paradigm and try something new in order to recapture their fleeting youth. We have been given two versions of this idea from a male and female perspective in two different movies. "American Beauty" focuses on a male character to address his midlife crises while "Shirley Valentine" focuses on a female character to address her midlife crises. Though they both address the same theme or idea it is attempted in very different ways. "American Beauty" is a socially conscious drama that hopes to sober us from meaningless materialism and to tap us back into the small beautiful things that we are likely to forget in life. "Shirley Valentine" provides us with a comedic look into the main character's life as she takes the frightening step out of the life that she allowed herself to fall into. These two movies stress essentially the same point though they work from opposite ends of the spectrum to achieve the goal of entertaining you while you are reacquainted with the beauty of life.
It is a fairly common prediction that everyone in our society goes through what is called a "midlife crises". A time of re-evaluation of the life one has led and a rebellion or abrupt change in life. To compensate for the banality of one's existence one takes a divergent step out of their paradigm and try something new in order to recapture their fleeting youth. We have been given two versions of this idea from a male and female perspective in two different movies. "American Beauty" focuses on a male character to address his midlife crises while "Shirley Valentine" focuses on a female character to address her midlife crises. Though they both address the same theme or idea it is attempted in very different ways. "American Beauty" is a socially conscious drama that hopes to sober us from meaningless materialism and to tap us back into the small beautiful things that we are likely to forget in life. "Shirley Valentine" provides us with a comedic look into the main character's life as she takes the frightening step out of the life that she allowed herself to fall into. These two movies stress essentially the same point though they work from opposite ends of the spectrum to achieve the goal of entertaining you while you are reacquainted with the beauty of life.