Everyone's a little crazy.

Rating: 9/10 (26 April 2018)

My first glance at The Silver Linings Playbook was during the 2013 Oscars when Jennifer Lawrence was nominated for best actress. The ceremony presented one of the most popular scenes from it, the scene that would compel me to watch it. She asks why Bradley Cooper ordered Raisin Brain, he says because he didn't want it to seem like a date. He says he hopes people don't associate his mental issues with her "crazy." She shows him crazy.
Part of me can't help but love this scene. This moment is so raw. Or Real? Perhaps neither. But it is so exhilarating. And many years after having first watched it, I think I may, now, know why.
It must her manic-pixie-dream-girl attitude. The politics of this movie already verge on the conservative but the introduction of a manic-pixie girl would perhaps seal the deal. Does she meet on the requirements of one? Perhaps not, but what are these requirements. I mean she seems manic, having sudden bursts of energy. And she does seems to share the spontaneous attitude Zooey Deschanel sports in 500 Days of Summer (an icon for the manic pixie dream girl trope). She also seems to enliven her lover the way one does. Her dancing seems to bring out new life in Bradley Cooper. It's no wonder my teenage self loved her. She brought out in Bradley Cooper that which a women would someday bring out in angsty-teen me.
My second glance into this movie was when my dad was watching it. After he finished up I asked how it was and he said "Good." Isn't it about someone who's crazy or something?" and he said "Everyone is a little crazy in this." I liked that description. It was as if everyone was a little crazy in their own way.
Does this movie romanticize mental disorders? Perhaps. Is that wrong? Probably. But as a person with a mental disorder I liked it. It made me feel like someday I would find someone cute and "crazy," and we could be "crazy" together. But my experience is a poor representation for all and I think it's a really a tricky sub genre to enter into, the romance between people with mental disorders. You will doubtless have to walk on thin ice to create a film that people won't find an issue. For how can one make a rom-com in this sub-genre without romanticizing the mental disorder. Isn't that what Romance does?
In any case, whether I like the politics or not, a part of me will always hold part of this film close to me. The acting is good, the script funny, the romance dysfunctioning(until the last few moments of film where Bradley Cooper takes her in his lap and steals a kiss, I'll ignore those moments) and cute. Lovely film.