Happily Ever After

And now, a list of movies which romanticize infidelity.

1) Camelot.

A delightful and classic musical. Guinevere gets bored with King Arthur and has an affair with Lancelot. 

Awards: 3 Oscars, 3 Golden Globes

Highlight: "If Ever I Would Leave You", Lancelot's doe-eyed musical number about how he's so in love that he won't stop seeing his best friend's wife behind his back. Aww, you charmer.

2) Shakespeare In Love.

Young Shakespeare finds his inspiration in young Viola, in a celebration of love shared by all except probably Mrs. Shakespeare who I guess is home raising their kids while all this is going on, and also probably the guy Viola is engaged to.

Awards: 7 Oscars (including Best Picture), 3 Golden Globes

Highlight: One of the bar patrons mentions Shakespeare's wife to Viola and after a brief moment of obligatory awkwardness (presumably to satisfy cultural expectations of at least token guilt) it is never mentioned again.  However Viola and Shakespeare's affair happens basically right in the face of her fiance and the movie goes out of its way to make fun of him for being cuckolded.

3) The Bridges of Madison County

Meryl Streep has an affair with Brad Pitt while her husband and children are away at the county fair. She is torn between passion and duty.  Eventually she takes the secret to her grave but reveals it in journals to her kids, whom she asks to sprinkle her ashes in the same place her lover's were scattered instead of burying her next to her faithful husband of many decades.  What a sweetie.

Awards: 1 Oscar, 2 Golden Globes

Highlight: "Robert, please. You don't understand, no-one does. When a woman makes the choice to marry, to have children; in one way her life begins but in another way it stops. You build a life of details. You become a mother, a wife and you stop and stay steady so that your children can move. And when they leave they take your life of details with them. And then you're expected move again only you don't remember what moves you because no-one has asked in so long. Not even yourself. You never in your life think that love like this can happen to you." - Meryl Streep, to Bradd Pitt, re: infidelity

There's a lot more.

In the Mood For Love (5 Hong Kong Film Awards)

The Notebook (8 Teen Choice "Awards")

Water For Elephants (1 People's Choice Award, Favorite Drama)

Brokeback Mountain (3 Oscars, 4 Golden Globes)

The English Patient

The Seven Year Itch

American Beauty

Titanic

...

-J