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submitted 5 months ago by Instigate@aussie.zone to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

My wife has been on a rom-com binge over the last year or so and something I’ve noticed when I’m vaguely paying attention or walking past is that almost every single rom-com features people who are, at the very least, middle to upper-middle class. These characters all live in gigantic houses/apartments, have beautifully sparkling brand-new cars, take month-long vacations to their beachfront properties… it’s just so unrealistic and out of line with the life that the vast majority of us lead.

I understand some concepts - large rooms are easier to film in, rich people own nice things that set a beautiful scene, it’s not interesting to discuss financial issues all the time etc. but this seems (from my anecdotal perspective) to almost be a rule of the genre.

Some more food for thought:

https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/a867107/rom-coms-diversity-wealth-income/

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[-] aleph@lemm.ee 18 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

I'd say a good-sized part of it is simply the American preference for watching beautiful, weathly people doing beautiful, wealthy people things. Hollywood rom-coms and US TV shows in general clearly skew towards upper middle class settings when compared to the equivalents from, say, the UK.

In other words, I reckon US media prefer their fictional characters to be aspirational whereas other cultures prefer theirs to be relatable.

[-] sping@lemmy.sdf.org 8 points 5 months ago

Yeah, the whole observation needed the adjective American.

Long so I noticed US soaps we're all wealthy people being miserable, while British soaps were all working class people being miserable, but Australian soaps were all working-class people being happy (after resolving some minor difficult situation).

[-] Alice@beehaw.org 1 points 5 months ago

Even our "relatable" characters never deal with housing insecurity, and their cars may have rust and dents but they're reliable.

this post was submitted on 28 Jun 2024
129 points (97.1% liked)

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