Butterflies and Hurricanes

A bumbling, messy, clumsy girl falls hopelessly in love-at-first-sight with an extremely hot, rich, expressionless, guy who is forcefully dark and deep and intense for no reason. She is low both on self-esteem, and common sense. He stares at her like a creep, while she behaves like a nervous puppy, breathing heavily and biting her lip awkwardly. They have never had a real conversation, but their surging hormones draw them towards each other. Generally, the guy stays away from women, but for some obscure reason he falls in love with this particular girls’ plain-ness. He asks her to stay away from him by telling her she is not right for him. But the girl still wants him because he’s so gosh darn good-looking. Sounds familiar?

Nope, I am not talking about Twilight.  I’m talking about 50 Shades of Goddamned Grey.

The story is rather regressive and quite astoundingly stupid. Here’s a woman, Anastasia, who belongs to a broken family and is rather unkempt, with contrasting shots of an insanely wealthy businessman, Grey, who has a separate drawer for each of his friggin buttons. Of COURSE she’s a literature student, otherwise how would you prove she’s a romantic? When Grey starts fancying her, he buys her expensive books, clothes, takes her for a helicopter ride and even gifts her a car! Because which self-respecting woman won’t be wooed by materialistic pleasures? He even sells her old car, which she was fond of, by the way, without even asking her. Hello? Boundaries!

When she calls him happily drunk from a nightclub, he demands her to stop drinking and tells her “I’m going to get you.” Bro, she didn’t ask for your help. When her friend tried to hit on her, she could have taken care of herself without you having to push him away. And who are you to tell her to drop drinking? She has a hard life, let her have her fun, you control freak!

He can’t bloody calm down when she goes off to meet her mom, for Christ’s sake.

Grey: “When were you going to tell me you were going to your mother’s?”

Ana: “Ugh, why are you angry?”

Grey: “Because you’re mine, all mine.” (starts kissing her frantically)

That’s some scary shit, right there. I would have broken up with him and walked off without even glancing back.

Anyway, she goes to her mom’s to spend time with her and think things over. This moron lands up without telling her, right when she’s chilling with her mom and TAKES AWAY THE AWESOME-LOOKING DRINK FROM HER HAND!

Wow. *slow clap* Way to let your woman have her own space.

Anyway, after wooing her with another flight, a fancy white airplane this time. (For some reason his idea of sweeping her off her feet is to do that literally: render her airborne. What will she do then?) He takes her back and gives her a contract asking her to be her ‘dismissive’ when they have sex. He would ‘punish’ her when she doesn’t follow the rules. She’s not even allowed to smoke or drink. She’s supposed to be completely devoted to him and his carnal pleasures.

Ana: Why would I do all this?

Grey: To please me

Ana: What do I get?

Grey: Me

Okay, let me get this straight. Basically, he wanted to own her and make her do exactly what he wanted, to give her the opportunity to make him happy. I’m welling up with the sheer magnitude of this kind, noble gesture.

The entire concept is screwed up. And this book is a bestseller? I have friends who never read, but devoured these books under their blankets at night. Multiple times. Says a lot about where our generation’s priorities lie.

Of COURSE, she is a virgin. Right. Like most single, attractive 20-somethings in Washington are. He feels it is his responsibility to ‘change the situation’ and does the needful, (without beating her up and scarring her for life, thankfully).

He tells her he doesn’t date and he doesn’t do romantic things, and yet he caresses her face, asks her out for coffee, sleeps with her, takes her out, sends her gifts, dances with her and gives her surprise visits. Predictably, he has some ‘childhood issues’ that turned him into what he is, and he narrates them to the audience pathetically while watching her sleep. His character is so annoying I don’t know how dumb Anastasia had to be to fall in love with him.

Now let’s talk about Anastasia. Why did she have to be so needy and weepy? If he had some idiotic problem and she didn’t approve of how he was treating her, she should have just walked off.  He asks if he could punish her, and she clearly doesn’t want it. But the need to know him and please him was so strong that she was willing to take it.

It’s okay if the woman enjoys BDSM, but it is not okay for a man to dictate his terms against her will. The whole deal about her sitting naked waiting for him like a slave, was deeply disturbing. She didn’t know any better and agreed to let him do all those things to her only because she wanted to be with him. Women empowerment, for the win.

There were so many things wrong about this movie, I’ve probably forgotten a few of them. Even the sex scenes were not convincing. I watched it out of curiosity when I discovered it was banned in India. While the movies are not allowed, the books are displayed in all the book stores across the country. #IndianLogic, bro.

Watching the movie was part of defying this, and all the other bans our country has recently imposed. I at least wished it was worth breaking the law for.