Response Paper

The topic I decided to use for my response paper is the typical radical romance and boy meets girl genre but with a twist. The piece of media I decided to use is a movie titled “Boomerang”. Even though the movie delivers the average radical romance there a twist within the plot.

            A romantic comedy is a dramatic story about romance told with a light, humorous touch. The romantic comedy often offers an experience of shared intimacy to couples married, dating, old, young, life-hardened that is fulfilling and pleasurable, and difficult to initiate or sustain for some people is that two protagonists, usually a man and a woman, meet, part ways due to an argument or other obstacle, then ultimately reunite. Usually the two protagonists meet and become involved initially, then must confront challenges to their union. Sometimes the two protagonists are hesitant to become romantically involved because they believe that they do not like each other, because one of them already has a partner, or because of social pressures. However, usually screenwriters leave clues that suggest that the characters are, in fact, attracted to each other and that they would be a good love match. The protagonists often separate or seek time apart to sort out their feelings or deal with the external obstacles to their being together..  While the two protagonists are separated, one or both of them usually realizes that they are ideal for each other, or that they are in love with each other. Then, after one of the two makes some spectacular effort to find the other person and declare their love.        

            This movie follows the same rhetoric of a romantic comedy that is explained in Tamar McDonald’s romantic comedy of boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy regains girl and lives happily ever after. Though in this film, there is actually more subjectivity than that. As a somewhat sexual role reversal to conceptual thinking has gone on. As Eddie Murphy is characterized as the player he is actually the one through the whole film being played. As the character Jacqueline, who is this strong, independent, self made woman has actually in turn became the female version of Murphy in the movie. This is personified in the scene when Jacqueline leaves after the both of them had just had sex and instead of cuddling and showing affection she decides to leave. As he explains, "Hey, wait a minute," he thinks. "That's my trick.” Jacqueline personifies the type of woman that where created during the sexual revolution as woman decided whom the wanted to have sex. Her education and her corporate demeanor was completely opposite of Halle Berry ‘s character Angela who forces this film to follow the boy meets girl genre. She is Eddie Murphy’s rebound, as Marcus becomes exactly like the woman he has hurt after breaking up with them: hurt, alone, and depressed. As she begins to go out with him (throughout the film you will notice that she expresses her feelings subtly), she becomes his new love interest. She even takes him back after he has an affair with Jacqueline, which shows the sharp contrast between her and Jacqueline in the first place           

            Boomerang is great movie to examine the constructs of relationships how they differ between people. The movie is a great way to exemplify the ideas of gender role where man is supposed to act a certain way and as for woman. Boomerang also exposes societies out look of a strong woman as with Jacqueline not getting the happy ending as Marcus did, even though she played the same games that he did. The male chauvinistic ideals are lambasted but do examine the genre.

Gender Role

The debate between the gender role of men and women has been a constant battle since the beginning of civilization. I know it sounds rhetorical but woman have sure had there uphill battles in there fight for equal rights and lets not forget how recent it was that women achieved there equal rights. It wasn’t until 1920 that women achieved the right to vote in America with passing of the 19^th amendment. The uphill battle still goes on today, the disparities between the genders still exist. The lingering question is though, why does still go on?

Simone De Beauvoir’s “the Second Sex” tries to examines this question for us in a most interesting answer. She explains that the relationship between men and women is communal in the sense one cannot live without the other. Its biological, one needs the other to survive and pro create. Although she explained, “she is defined and differentiated with reference to man and not he with reference to her”, even in writing and speech they cannot free themselves escaping man. Think about the words: feMALE, woMAN, as she would explain that women throughout the past have been referenced as the other sex. She also explains also that the only way women where to exit this peril was to get up and see eye to eye with men. I believe this explains the idea of the Post-Modern woman, with the gains in technology and rampant globalization.It seems we aare the stage of seeing a lot of women in a lot of high ranking positions with more opportunities of course granted to them..  The funny thing is during this semester we discussed that globalization or the spread of capitalism. It’s funny because I remember discussing that capitalism is destroying culture but without-it women would be stuck in the same position. Correct? I guess that’s a question for another day