This seems to be the week of relationship movies. Unconsciously (thus probably not accidentally) I've seen to movies about couples in the past days Alle Anderen and Revolutionary Road. Although they're set in different countries (Germany; USA) and different times (present; the 50s), both show a fairly young (meaning: roughly my age) couple trying to come to terms with their relationship, their dreams, the future they imagined for themselves. Generally speaking, they were trying to negotiate the difference between ideal and reality of their relationship.
A lot of the things in these movies resonated in me: Here were protagonists my age trying to make some sort of major life decision; wrestling with the question whether they had "succeeded" in realizing their dreams or not and whether or not they were living the life they had imagined for themselves. It was a lot about not only assessing (if you want to call it that way) yourself, but also their partners as a sort of "mirror image" of themselves. Partners, like children, are sometimes a sort of appendix of our selves (like a trophy wife). We seem to think that we are judged according to the person we are with. Needless to say, both movies were also about "the others" - society, community, families - and how they perceive us as a couple; as part of an entity.
The situation I am in right now is different, of course, because I am single. And the difference, I believe in regard to those movies, is mainly that I cannot blame another person for not being the way I want to be; not living the life I want to live.
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