Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Mr and Mrs Smith

So I'm really behind on the movies, and I haven't even finished this one yet and it's been out well over a year.

But since it's obviously following the formula

couple fight
couple finds a common enemy
couple unite

I really don't have to hurry to finish it.

What I'm thinking is that if you need a really good example of how important it is to have that work intimacy plate spinning in your relationship, this would be it.

They're both assassins in the movie and can't tell each other what they're doing with their day-light hours. They have "secrets."

So of course they're on the verge of breaking up, the movie opens with Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt seeing a marriage therapist. The focus for most of us might be the enormous cloud of deception.

Righly so. The important lesson, the only reason I'd even suggest anyone watch a horrible movie with SO much gratuitous violence, marital violence at that, is to demonstrate by exaggeration that deception and lack of communication irreparably dilute intimacy.

What the marital therapist said in the movie isn't true. All marriages do not ultimately become disengaged, less communicative over time.

Only dysfunctional marriages do.

So go home and talk about your day with your partner if you have one. Rattle on, it's okay.

And don't, by the way, think all that physical violence between Mr. and Mrs. Smith is sexy. IT'S NOT.

Not if you want a sexy loving relationship. Beating on one another is the antithesis of "loving."

Is that a value judgement? Don't care if it is.

Copyright 2006, TherapyDoc

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Open and honest communication is key to a successful relationship. The more we talk to each other about our day, our thoughts, our worries, our hopes, the closer we will become and stay!
You are so right, not all marriages are doomed to be disengaged over time.

therapydoc said...

What I forgot to say is that a couple doesn't always have to say everything to be close. Older couples sometimes do know what's going on, can "read minds" to a degree.

But that verbal interaction is friendly, it's affectionate, so I push it even with older couples when one of the two partners thinks it's not necessary to talk or prefers not to. The process is more intimate.

But not too much talk, right?

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