Paulie: Lesbian? Lesbian? Are you *beep* kidding me, you think I'm a LESBIAN?
Mouse: You're a girl in love with a girl, aren't you?
Paulie: No! I'm PAULIE in love with TORI.
'cause We Fall In Love For The Person, Not The Gender.
True. This short exchange of lines between Paulie and Mouse is so masterful. It’s the ones I will always remember from this little forgotten cinematic gemstone. Like you say: we fall in love with the person, not the gender.
I’m a super straight male, who like love stories a lot more than war stories. And I always felt that females in love with females are more *credible* as lovers, than males and females, and males and males.
Basically, love is a female thing, not a male thing. Females creates and preserves – males constructs and destructs. So, like one American anthropologist once asked (the title of her essay): “Did Mother Nature play a hideous joke on mankind?”
"Why is it that men are so much more interested in women than women in men?"
Virginia Woolf
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geoh777
15 years ago
"'cause We Fall In Love For The Person, Not The Gender."
This argument fails when we consider all the rug chewing, etc. that goes on.
Let's be honest and call it what it is.
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quiteclassically
15 years ago
Not necessarily. All sexual organs are pretty gross when you look at them objectively. For a lot of people they're sexually attracted to another person and they become attracted to the person's body because of that.
I mean, I think it's kind of silly for a woman who's in love with another woman to refuse the label lesbian as if there's something shameful about being attracted to women--as if it's only okay to be in love with a woman if you're mostly straight and that's an exception. But oral sex as the basis of a sexual orientation? I wouldn't say so.
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cara-picone
15 years ago
That's the problem I had with the movie. Paulie was all open about being in love with Tori, but when it came to the term "lesbian," she was offended when Mary used that word. I understand that the movie was about love, and how it's okay to love whoever you want to love, but this exchange kind of made it seem like being a lesbian has nothing to do with love. It's stupid. They could have been bi, but don't act like that's somehow better than being gay.
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quiteclassically
15 years ago
Yeah, exactly. I guess that was probably supposed to be Paulie's messed-up point of view rather than the screenwriter's opinion, but they could have made it more clear.
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PierrotClown
13 years ago
i think paulie never loved someone (boy, girl, family - because she don't have one).. she never love anyone except Tory (who loves her back..), and she didn't understand how can be asked if she is a lesbian.. when she only love The One for her. i think for the first time she feels love (and all the love who can't give to other people, she gives to Tori).
I'm sorry i don't realy know english, but i hope you'll understand my point.
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nigel-952-885999
12 years ago
In single sex boarding schools there was always the possibility that otherwise straight kids could fall in love with members of their own sex. Trying to pigeon hole those who do as lesbian/gay or bisexual is not helpful, and as you say Tory could well have been her first and only love.
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RavenGlamDVDCollector
10 years ago
The world needs more love. We are in short supply of it. Whatever kind of personal bits are attached to you, doesn't matter.
And stop judging people.
End of story.
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gch525
9 years ago
"Basically, love is a female thing, not a male thing." Well, thats a preposterous and baseless statement.
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