The Mirror has Two Faces
(TriStar Pictures, 1996, 126 Minutes)
Review by William Buskist, Auburn University
Film Relevance and Connection to the Text
This movie is about love, sex, romance, and one's sense of self. Thus, the movie can be viewed best in light of the following two chapters in Moghaddam's book: Chapter 3: The Self in Culture, Chapter 8: Liking and Loving.
Summary/Synopsis
Rose Morgan is a professor of literature at Columbia University. Gregory Larkin is a professor of mathematics at the same school. She is an unattractive but brilliant lecturer who has failed miserably at love. He is an attractive, but boring lecturer who believes that sex has ruined his previous relationships with women. He sets out to find a "perfect" relationship-one without sex-and is led to Rose. They marry. She is starved for sexual union, and he does all he can to avoid it. Their marriage seems all but over when Rose transforms her appearance through diet, exercise, and a makeover in a desperate attempt to increase her sex appeal. Gregory finally discovers that beneath her frumpiness is a beautiful woman who he still loves. Ultimately, their marriage is consummated, and they both live happily ever after: she realizes that she is really an attractive woman and he realizes that sex has its redeeming virtues.
Discussion Questions
- Characterize Rose's self-concept at the outset of the film. How might her self-concept have been influenced by her family, particularly her mother and her sister?
- Characterize Gregory's self-concept at the outset of the film. How might his self-concept have been influenced by his failed romances?
- Using Sternberg's triangular theory of love, trace the development of Rose and Gregory's relationship through the various "types" of love.
- Do Rose and Gregory have different ideas about the function of sex in a relationship? Both seem to be consumed by it, but for different reasons. Explain your answer.
- Is it is possible for a close relationship or friendship to develop between a heterosexual man and a heterosexual woman that is wholly platonic-that is, absent of sexual union or the interest in having sexual union? This movie seems to indicate that such relationships are unlikely, but what you do think and why? Relate your answer to what you have learned so far this term about the "social psychology of love."
- This film seems to indicate that people, especially women, view themselves as being "beautiful people," only if such beauty is validated by those around them. Do you think that this is true? For example, did Rose need to have others tell her that she was beautiful in order for her to see herself as being an attractive person? Is being the object of sexual desire the only way that a person can derive satisfaction from love or marriage?
- Gregory's unwillingness to make love with Rose seemed to convey a certain selfishness in that he was only thinking about his own needs. Do you believe this to be true? Explain your answer in terms of the social psychological dynamics characteristic of his previous relationships.
- Near the end of the film, it looks as though Rose is going to fall for Alex, an attractive man on whom she once had a crush. Just as he is about to make a major romantic move, she tells him that he is not good enough for her and leaves him alone in front of the fire place. What was she really communicating to him, and how did her message reflect on her newly refurbished self-concept?
Student Assignment Suggestions
- Ask your students to imagine that they had the opportunity to rewrite the screenplay for this movie according to their own conceptions of how people like Rose and Gregory might fall in love. Ask them to write an essay that provides a brief overview about how they would rewrite they might recast these characters based on what they have learned about physical attraction and love this academic term.
- To help students better understand the role of physical attraction in romantic relationships, have them write a brief essay that summarizes and evaluates the way "Hollywood" depicted this concept in this film. Students should draw comparisons between what social psychologists have learned through empirical means about physical attraction with the manner in which this film portrays physical attraction.
- Ask students to examine their own feelings and motives for love by having them write an essay that describes, from their point of view, the most important elements of loving, in a romantic sense, someone else. Ask students to share their views in class and encourage discussion of the similarities and differences of these views.
|