Pretty in Pink (1986)
Writer: John Hughes
Director: Howard Deutch
Actors: Molly Ringwald (Andie), John Cryer (Duckie), Andrew McCarthy (Blane)
Friends with Money (2006)
Writer and Director: Nicole Holofcener
Actors: Jennifer Aniston (Olivia), Catherine Keener (Christine), Frances McDormand (Jane), Joan Cusack (Franny)
Dahling,
There are so many elements on the earth but the same ones keep coming back to us, showing up.
Air, water, earth, wood, metal. All have their uses, their flavors. All are resources and languages.
So what kind of element is this “money” thing? Money is sometimes cash, but not always. A lot of times, money is theoretical—a list of numbers on a screen. The number goes up, it goes down, and it depends upon stock markets, or the day of the week, and something called interest, and seemingly random percentage rates, and it is all just very metaphorical at the same time as it is tangible.
Two movies I love that explore money as a theme, interwoven with stories about relationships and love, are Pretty in Pink (director Howard Deutsch) and Friends with Money (written and directed by Nicole Holofcener).
Both movies involve friends, and a class system. Pretty in Pink is in a high school, and the poorer kids don’t like the richer kids, and vice versa. These groups are like two tribes in a continual contest. The poor have all this valor about being poor, and they have really funky fashion sense, too. Andie, played by Molly Ringwald, has a huge chip on her shoulder about the rich kids, because she suffers from this affliction of unworthiness. Not everyone around her does—Andie has a special bitterness. At the same time, she has these lush pink lips that make her shine like ripe fruit, and she has such a knack for fashion design, and she is resourceful and hardworking and does well in school. She is also emotional at the same time as she is diligent and running things at home. Her dad is depressed and withdrawn and lovelorn for a woman who left him, and Andie has to be the mom to him, at the same time as she goes without a mom and falls in love and puts up with high school bullcrap every day.
In Friends with Money, the character Olivia (played by Jennifer Aniston) is similarly bitter about money, and confused about what it means. She just hides it better. She is in LA, and she is an “adult,” and it is more effective and classy to hide her demons. That is what people expect you to do, especially her friends, who do not have the same fears of starving and making rent and being successful in their careers. Her friends—all who she has known since college—have stability and spouses, and they had enough of a sense of self-worth that they were able to follow their dreams—even though their dreams don’t make them happy. Jane, played by Frances McDormand, has a fashion line of expensive clothes that everyone loves. Inside though, she’s annoyed with life, so depressed she doesn’t have the energy to wash her long hair. She has such a loving husband and a beautiful child, and yet nothing feels right and she wants to curse at everyone. “Life isn’t fair! Why aren’t I happy!”, is her mantra underneath every interaction. I love her for it. I love her, I love her, I love her, because she puts out in the open what everyone is thinking underneath. This character is so fully realized that, in my opinion, she steals the show. But she is not the only one who “has it all” and is unhappy. Christine, played by Catherine Keener, is a screenwriter along with her husband, and they have this nice little LA house that they want to expand. Their idea of expansion does not take the neighbors into account, because Christine’s desire for a bedroom with a view now obfuscates everyone else’s view on the street. She didn’t know that would happen. She wasn’t thinking of other people—just herself. And her husband is a real asshole, and nothing is ever enough for either of them, and there is no tenderness or kindness in their marriage.
Meanwhile, Olivia is broke and lonely and stealing face cream. She can’t get this boyfriend out of her head who she had an affair with, and he is just not into her. So she tries out a physical trainer someone recommends, but he is not really into her either. In fact, he’s practically stealing money and time and sex from her, and she has no idea how to process or understand how such a problematic and weird relationship dynamic has taken hold. What is happening? What is life about? Where should she be? Who should she be? Why are people paying thousands of dollars for a seat at a dinner party when they could just donate the money to a homeless shelter without all the hoopla?
God, I love this movie. It is not about money, it is about attitude and class and lifestyle. It is about people who consider that money is the root of life, and that is why people in the movie are deeply unhappy, and mimic the ethos of an elite American white cultural elite. (I respect people who are who they are, unabashedly, regardless of how annoying their truths may be.)
Meanwhile, Andie in Pretty in Pink doesn’t have such nuanced concerns—her drama is the boy she likes in high school, Blane, who is in a veritable cage of money and luxury. Money doesn’t make him happy, either. He sees her, he thinks she is special, but the demons of his own class and status and high school brood keep him from going all in for her heart and her time. And Andie wrestles with her own fears about dating him, but she comes to a conclusion that is totally accurate, when she explains to her best friend Duckie why she is going to give Blane a chance—“Us hating them just because they have money is the same thing as them hating us because we don’t!”
What we learn in both the movies is that money is a construct, and it is not. In some ways it makes a difference. It makes a difference because it is a resource, and having a resource at your disposal that is plentiful and desired, may make you feel plentiful and desired. Sometimes. Not having a resource that most of the population needs and desires, may make you feel undesired, and not valuable or worthy.
It’s a crapshoot. Who knows. Do you see my point, lucky little kachina?
The questions are, how much does money dictate our decisions? How much do we believe it is the root and soul of everything? How much do we value what we have, vs. what we do not have? Where do we put our attention and our focus, killah?
Instead of “either/or,” are we able to consider and live into “yes, and” when it comes to financial resources?
How about we give money less attention and focus in helping to make all of the big life decisions, and give love and kindness, truth and intimacy with others—Oneness—more time in our individual lives, as a practice? And let’s see how it makes us feel. And then come to really know?
Treat life as an experiment, all the good Buddhists say.
Hugs,
Ms. Wonderful