What It's About:
Loretta Castorini (Cher) is a widow who waited for true love and then lost him too soon. Now in her 30s, she's settling down with sweet, kind, completely harmless Johnny Cammareri (Danny Aiello) in a marriage planned on security and companionship rather than love and passion. At Johnny's request, Loretta visits his estranged brother Ronny (Nicholas Cage), and sparks fly in every direction. They begin a furtive romance hindered by his insistence conflicting with her reticence. Eventually, love carries far more weight than security, and Loretta becomes engaged to the right brother—and the right man—after all...much to the chagrin of her mother (Olympia Dukakis), who asks about Ronnie, "Loretta, do you love him?" Loretta responds, "Ma, I love him awful," and her mother says, "Oh God, that's too bad."
Why It's Worth Watching:
First of all, it's an acting tour-de-force, with Academy-Award-winning performances from Cher (best actress) and Olympia Dukakis (best supporting actress) plus and winning original screenplay from John Patrick Shanley. Vincent Gardenia, who plays Loretta's father (who's cheating on her mother throughout the film, a major subplot), director Norman Jewison, and the film itself were all nominating for Oscars as well. Nic Cage is his own Internet meme machine, but in 1987, he was still an up-and-coming actor, and he shows his weird skills to ideal effect in this film. This is a film with a unique sense of place, emphasizing both the immigrant-otherness of Little Italy in New York City combined with a quintessential Americanism that seems familiar to all audiences. It's a wonderful, splendid movie to watch from beginning to end.
What's in it for Her:
There's a good reason why Cinderella is one of the most enduring stories in Western culture (and why all three of the Big Bang Theory women wanted to be her on their trip to Disneyland): it hits right at the heart of the romantic fantasy that the perfect person will swoop into our bland, dreary lives, take us away from toil and drudgery and give us a happily-ever-after ending. Moonstruck is essentially a retelling of that tale, with Loretta stuck at home with her parents, with a boring job as a bookkeeper, and settling for a man she doesn't love. Ronny makes an unlikely prince, but when you hear him talk about love, you see why he's the right man for her.
What's in it for Him:
I have a theory—most guys are going to deny it, but I don't care—that we're all a lot more romantic than we care to admit; maybe in some cases even more romantic than many women. Think about how many of the most well-known film archetypes do what they do for the love of a woman, from Bogart in Casablanca to Indiana Jones to John McClane in Die Hard. Moonstruck isn't an action movie, but it does involve a man who falls head over heels for a woman who's out of his reach. However, rather than deter him, it redoubles his resolve to win her heart. I've never met a male who didn't have a sharp memory of an unrequited crush; who doesn't think about what might have been if you'd made that grand romantic gesture, if you'd gone all out to win her love. Maybe you did. Maybe you're with her right now. Either way, Moonstruck will inspire that underlying sense of romance.
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