Name a movie where a romantic plot/subplot bugs you

[nonmerci]

Hi all!

I'm pretty sure we can all name movies or shows when something romantic happened and we are just there wondering "why?" or "what?". And among these movies or shows, some are weirder than others.

This thread is there so you can share the things that make you pause and wonder "how is that possible?".

 

If I begin, I'd talk about Love, Actually. It's not the worst romantic movie I saw, but one of the story make me wonder how allos brain are functioning... Can someone explain to me how the writer and the housekeeper falls in love, enough to engage, but they don't speak the same language? I suppose the message was that romantic love transcend language barrier but come on. I would get if they find another way than English or Portuguese to communicate, but... no. I can buy a lot of things but this one is weird.

[Jedi]

Funnily enough, that isn't the Love, Actually plot that bugs me. I thought those two were fine. What I didn't understand was the married guy who was buying gifts for his flirty coworker. I initially read their interactions as him being vaguely uncomfortable and annoyed with her, I do not see why he was tempted at all. Just dumb decisions for no reasons that are beyond me.

The first movie that comes to mind where the romance subplot really annoyed me is the Hobbit movies. I'm not sure you could shoehorn in a terrible romantic plot in a place where it absolutely doesn't belong worse if you tried.

 

[vvv]

Something I learned about myself from bingeing the Crown is that I can no longer watch a biopic or film/show based on real life without googling "did ___ really happen" in the middle of the show or film.

I just watched the United States vs. Billie Holiday. (spoilers for the film) I love Billie Holiday, loved Andra Day's performance as Lady Day so much. They included her marriages and some relationships (only the straight ones explicitly, for "some reason") that were portrayed as awful and abusive. Throughout about the latter half of the film, she is depicted as having a very "refreshing" and "healthy" relationship with a man... A man who, in real life and in the film, was an FBI agent that played a significant role in having her incarcerated for a year for drug possession by getting close to her and finding out when the feds could catch her doing heroin. Then, in the movie, after this, they fall in love. Have a relationship, the movie would tell you, until the moment she dies. Even though she was married to another (toxic and abusive) man in the interim who also tried to set her up, she still maintains a "pure" relationship with the FBI agent. He goes on tour with her. Billie's friends are first suspicious of him because he got her incarcerated by building a relationship under false pretenses, but eventually they all do heroin together and suddenly he is bound to be the best man in the world who will (try to, at least) carry her the rest of the movie when she's at her lowest and be there to stare disapprovingly when her lowest involves other men. Even help her stay clean (sometimes).

So I looked it up during the movie. After her being incarcerated, the rest of their relationship was completely fictional. It was just too damn cheesy, I had to know. It sucks so much, because without him, it would've just been about her and her own complicated relationships and her art... I think they were trying to make him an audience proxy, but, it felt like he was supposed to her savior even though it changed nothing about her life.

And, I'm not even asexual, but knowing that it was basically a fanfic insert, the sex scene that came out of that depiction felt pretty damn gross after knowing that. Ehggdsdf.
 

[nonmerci]

On 3/7/2021 at 7:43 PM, Jedi said:

The first movie that comes to mind where the romance subplot really annoyed me is the Hobbit movies. I'm not sure you could shoehorn in a terrible romantic plot in a place where it absolutely doesn't belong worse if you tried.

Oh yeah, the Hobbit. Even the allos think it was unnecessary, that says something.

@vvvthat sounds like a stupid change. Not only they add a romantic subplot, but they added one that they showed as sane when it is not. That's a weird choice.

[Rainy Robin]

I know this may be controversial, but I thought it was totally unnecessary that the Harry Potter series had both the Ron&Hermione ship and the Harry&Ginny ship. I only ever thought of them as friends, and it felt pretty forced to put them together by the end of the series. I think the books did a better job of integrating those subplots than the movies did, but the whole thing felt weird to me anyways. 

Also, I've always thought of Luna Lovegood as aroace so I didn't see her in a romantic relationship with Neville. ?‍♂️

[nonmerci]

For what I read, the director of the movies didn't like these couples so he makes them as akward as possible in the movies, in particular Harry and Ginny. Though Harry and Ginny don't make that much sense in the books on my opinion (Harry never paid attention to Ginny but he sees her kising someone and suddenly he is into her, that's weird).

Also Neill was never in love with Luna in the books, they added it in the movie because a lot was shipping them I think.

[Cinematic]

Love, Actually is a romantic mess, I swear, most of the relationships shown are unfeasible or toxic in some way (and Emma Thompson's character did not deserve what happened to her). I get that this one is a bit more random, but I never got the romance in Ratatouille. In a story about a chef realising his dreams, why do you even need a romance subplot in the first place? I would much rather have seen more of Remy interacting with his family, or the legend that is Anton Ego - Linguini and Collette were better as a mentor-student pair than a couple.

[Rainy Robin]

12 hours ago, nonmerci said:

For what I read, the director of the movies didn't like these couples so he makes them as akward as possible in the movies

That makes total sense. It completely comes through in the movies!

12 hours ago, nonmerci said:

Also Neill was never in love with Luna in the books, they added it in the movie because a lot was shipping them I think.

Oh, thanks for the clarification. I suppose I could see them in a QPR or something like that, but the whole thing feels a bit stilted to me. 

[Blake]

My movie where the romantic plot felt pure weird was Brother Bears 2. It was plain weird for me to have to watch because (the spoiler is about the movie and my opinion of it):

Spoiler

the protagonist was a human before being a bear and he got in loved with a female bear. so he lived 15-18 years as human and you are telling me that he found love with a bear. that speaks bestiality to me and I did not liked it one bit.

So trying to sell me the idea that he got a romantic attraction toward the female was just plain nop for me. This doesn't include the fact that he was putting romantic love about platonic love, which is another topic that I did not as a kid understood but present me now is dissecting.

[DeltaAro]

I extremely disliked it in Interstellar, and that "Love transcends time and space" speech ruined the movie for me.

[Daydream_dog94]

i stopped watching ages ago but greys anatomy!! like, i understand that relationships make for good drama but i feel like 2 characters couldn't interact normally without eventually having sex or dating.. it just became repetitive lol

On 3/15/2021 at 8:31 PM, Blake said:

My movie where the romantic plot felt pure weird was Brother Bears 2. It was plain weird for me to have to watch because (the spoiler is about the movie and my opinion of it):

  Reveal hidden contents

the protagonist was a human before being a bear and he got in loved with a female bear. so he lived 15-18 years as human and you are telling me that he found love with a bear. that speaks bestiality to me and I did not liked it one bit.

So trying to sell me the idea that he got a romantic attraction toward the female was just plain nop for me. This doesn't include the fact that he was putting romantic love about platonic love, which is another topic that I did not as a kid understood but present me now is dissecting.

yeah, honestly same.. also the movie is called "brother bear" and i feel like the first one did a really good job of portraying that.. didnt need a sequel and ESPECIALLY didnt need a sequel with a love story. at that point it completely disregards the title, which should have been red flag number one lol 

[Sab]

It's not a movie, but a game that makes me beside myself; The game Vampyr. You play as an ex-soldier/surgeon named Johnathan and in the beginning of the game you turn into a strong and epic vampire! There's alot of choices you can make to increase or decrease morality via killing or not killing humans around you. Everyone is accessible to you except for, of course, the love interest. She just so happens to be a vampire as well and I don't have a problem with your character falling in love with another... it's just that you don't get to decide your interactions with her. The main character will always swoon for her and it doesn't feel like I am actually in control of my choices, unlike with everything else in the game. It's frustrating and the game is older(ish) so the potential for another game is low. It's really unfortunate because it is such a good game. I really hate forced romance plots...

[roboticanary]

one I found  annoying in a different way was Syriana

interesting movie by the way, political intrigue involving the selling off of oil fields in the middle east.

however it has a lot of people who the movie struggles to humanize. not sure the best way to put that but you have morally dubious secret agents, middle eastern royalty with oil money, people involved in Islamic fundamentalist groups. The movie has a need to show the audience that these people are just guys. 

Once I realised this was going on it was very difficult to avoid. The way the movie makes these people human is *he has a wife and kids*. It gets slightly annoying.

[The Gray Warlock]

Every single 90s action movie. Find a list, pick a title. It's sure to have a "love interest" shoehorned into the plot someplace. My "favorite" example is a heist film with Nicholas Cage (I forget the name of it) where he and his cohorts hide out in a small New England town. There's a girl he meets, and at the end of the film (which takes place over 2 1/2 days btw) and with no build up, they're making out. I think "The Rock" is the only film from that era that doesn't have a romantic subplot. A true outlier. And remember, I'm talking about the same era where a Best Picture was given to a romance-themed film whose backdrop was the most famous shipwreck in history!

God, no wonder teenage me was so confused. 

[DeltaAro]

The romantic subplot in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker was so extremely bad, I literally can't remember it - except that it involved Rey and Ben. It is a repressed memory. 😉

Edited July 30, 2022 by DeltaV

[Deltalorian]

On 3/18/2021 at 10:57 PM, DeltaV said:

I extremely disliked it in Interstellar, and that "Love transcends time and space" speech ruined the movie for me.

I like to pretend that the film ends after Cooper enters the black hole. Up to that point, it's really scientifically sound (and I really like it anyway) and I think it'd have been really cool if in cinemas, a film ends after the presumed death of a main protagonist and the survival of humanity up to viewer interpretation.

1 hour ago, DeltaV said:

The romantic subplot in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker was so extremely bad, I literally can't remember it - except that it involved Rey and Ben. It is a repressed memory. 😉

I feel like they saw Anakin and Padme's relationship in AoTC and thought "Hey, we could do that, but worst!" and props to them, because somehow, they fucking did it. Speaking of which, yeah, I like AoTC, but take out about 1/2 of the Anakin and Padme scenes, and I feel like it's massively improved.

[alto]

I second Sheldon.  They ruined Sheldon.

[Pyr]

As a reply to Deltalorian-- yes totally! Tbh Padme was great character until she started loving anakin.

Something I see a lot in books is when the author just throws all the characters into relationships at the very end! Harry potter has this,so does the King of Scars series. (king of scars spoilers ahead) I headcanned Zoya as aroace, because she said and thought a lot of aro stuff throught the book but then apparently she loved Nikolai the whole time? (SHe even specifically thinks something along the lines of, "I'm not like Nikolai. He's a romantic, I'm not.") So normally I just tell myself that theyre just confused about their feelings, and that the relationshipbwill fail. Still gonna say that Zoya is aro.

[Deltalorian]

2 hours ago, Pyr said:

Tbh Padme was great character until she started loving anakin.

I'd be fine with it if it wasn't for the catalyst of why she starts loving him - she does so out of empathy/sympathy because he's lost his mother and is angry at himself for how he handled the situation, whereas if she started loving him after the battle on the Geonosis area, recognising his talents and skills, falling for that instead, I feel like it would make the relationship feel more genuine and natural at the start, while straining it later on, as Anakin believes that Padme loves him only because of his power, and is more easily tempted to the dark side because of the power it promises.

Wait, what am I doing again? Oh yeah, complaining about AoTC. I dunno, I feel like there are many ways the relationship could have been done better, but I would have probably made it worst if I had written those ideas.

[DeltaAro]

6 hours ago, Deltalorian said:

I'd be fine with it if it wasn't for the catalyst of why she starts loving him - she does so out of empathy/sympathy because he's lost his mother and is angry at himself for how he handled the situation

"Handled the situation". A nice way to describe that he committed mass murder.

IMHO a good explanation for Padmé's very relaxed reaction "to be angry is to be human" would've been warranted.

Edited July 31, 2022 by DeltaV

[Nix]

19 hours ago, DeltaV said:

IMHO a good explanation for Padmé's very relaxed reaction "to be angry is to be human" would've been warranted.

Yes that was so jarring… I remember being very disturbed when I first saw this movie when I was 15, mostly because my female friends were blind to how wrong it all was. Luckily my current allo friends agree that is is a very toxic relationship.