The Guilty Pleasure (And Why does Everyone Hate On Rom-Coms?)

“Romantic comedies are rarely seen as art, unless they are Annie Hall or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (again: prestige filmmaking that rely on filmmaking gimmickry as much as they do realistic human emotion, also: a male perspective). Nora Ephron gets a bad rap for this, too: she’s treated as low-brow because, I suppose, she was working in a more commercial space. I have a friend who knew Ephron, and he once put it very well: she was smart as hell, and could have been a Susan Sontag type if she wanted to. But she didn’t: she wanted to be entertaining—and she did so by also being smart as hell. It seems pointless to compare the two, but people seem hell-bent on proving that artists who choose light, mainstream material aren’t as worthy of appreciation as the opposite. Which is real dumb, because why can’t you like both?” 

 Tyler Coates, Deputy Editor at Decider via A Presentation of Seamlessness: A Roundtable Discussion On Nancy Meyers

I hate the idea of a ‘guilty pleasure’ if a piece of media gives me pleasure and I find entertainment from it why on earth should I feel guilty? Why should I be limited to only what other’s define as ‘high brow’ ? Why can’t I have my Danny Boyle and my Nora Ephron?  Is it possible that people write things off in their head by pre-conceived notions (Yes, this is a rhetorical question) ?

This began to cross my head during last week’s reading about textual analysis and how audience feedback in unreliable:

“Because when you ask a viewer what they think of a particular program, or magazine, or film, you do not find out what they think about the program per se – rather, you find out what they say about a program, to an academic who is interviewing them, in answer to a specific question!…Often people will emphasise the ‘quality’ programming that they watch, and denigrate programs that they actually like (‘those soap operas, they’re crap’) because they think that this is what researchers want to hear (even if it isn’t)”

(Mckee, p. 9-10) ¹

As someone who gets as much enjoyment out of and equally regards a show like The Mindy Project (a show that critics love but many people I know would say it’s nothing more than a romantic comedy (why are we so low on rom-coms?)) to that of Lars Von Triers arthouse masterpiece Melancholia it’s important to remember that different sets of skills are needed for different pieces.

I’ve also noticed people are reluctant to think highly of things before they hear critics approval. This was certainly true in my personal experience of recommending Jane The Virgin to people while the first season was airing on The CW in the States ². When describing the plot to friends and family along with the fact that it was broadcasted on The CW I could tell they seemed not interested. And when pressed as to why would often say it seemed ridiculous and like a soap opera ³. I saw a dramatic shift in opinion once the show started receiving critical acclaim and its star, Gina Rodriguez won a Golden Globe for her portrayal of Jane.⁴