All five of us love Family Movie Night. The only trouble we tend to run into is choosing a Family Movie. Primo likes movies that are either too scary or too esoteric for the little kids. Seconda loves tween Disney flicks which Primo (and I) abhor. Terza's up for anything but loses interest after 10 minutes if it's not quite right for her, and by "loses interest" I mean she climbs on the furniture and yells menically or smacks her siblings in the head or throws Goldfish in the air like confetti.
So imagine my delight when I thought of the perfect Family Movie: Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. Had I ever seen this movie? No, I had not. But I distinctly remember it being my little cousin's favorite movie when she was a kid and also, it was old, so how inappropriate could it be? There was sure to be no sex and no cursing. And once, I googled it and a Youtube clip popped up featuring the coolest gymnastics/ dance number ever. Perfect, I figured.
And it was, for about the first hour. I mean, yes, it was dated, and the main character, Adam, treats his wife like a servant, and not like a human being, but that's something she takes issue with so it was a good talking point. But then, halfway through the movie, Adan started singing a strange song, about the rape of the Sabine women.
"This is really weird," I commented to David. "Why is he singing this song about the Sabine women?"
"Because that's basically the whole plot of the movie," he said.
"What movie?" I asked. "This movie?"
"Yeah," he answered. "Haven't you ever seen this movie before?"
"No," I confessed. "Are you kidding me? These seven brothers are all about to kidnap their brides?"
And - spoiler alert -- that is exactly what they do.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
It is a modern day Rape of the Sabines. That's what the WHOLE movie is about. And guess what? It works out GREAT for the guys. Their captives get Stockholm Syndrome and never want to leave. So they all get married in one big group ceremony, and the only reason the girls' dads agree to that is the girls convince the dads they've gotten knocked up and are, thus, ruined. Thankfully that plot point is packed into the last two minutes and is glossed over so we didn't have to explain the whole concept of a shotgun wedding to our eight-year-old daughter.
"Why didn't you warn me that's what this whole movie is about?" I asked David,
"Oh, it's fine," he said/ "The men suffer the consequences of their actions/"
"Not really," I protested. "I mean, they sleep in the barn for, like, a month. And then the girls totally fall for them and they all get married. Whereas, really, they should all be incarcerated."
Promo overhead me. He was laughing his ass off about how ridiculous the plot was.
"They should call is Seven Trials for Seven Brothers," he laughed.
Indeed.
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