Love & Other Drugs - Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal & Anne Hathaway
IMDB Link: Love & Other Drugs
8Track Love Movie Playlist
My favorite song from the movie: Maggie & Jamie by Bloodstream
Why I love the movie: This movie is difficult for me because the storyline is about a woman who has an incurable and progressive disease, Parkinsons. Maggie is an artist, a free spirit that says exactly what she thinks and lives life with gusto, a passion and fearlessness that many of us are unable to attain.
It's not until the middle of the movie that you see the disease progressing and how that affects her on a physical and emotional level. As painful as it is to watch, it's also inspiring to see how hard she fights for normalcy, to not be a victim of her own body.
The movie shines a light on a subject that rarely comes up in film - the guilt that sick people feel over how their illness or disease affects those around them, specifically their loved ones. How do we ask or expect or even want them to stick with us through possible years of changes the disease will enforce.
One of the hardest scenes of the movie is when an older gentleman, whose wife has had Parkinsons for years, talks with Jamie, Maggie's boyfriend. Jamie, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, is new to being in a relationship with a person who is ill. The older man lays out what it's like to love someone with a disease.
He brings home the point of - I fell in love with a healthy, vibrant woman and what I'm left with is a sick, slowly dwindling away, wife. He makes it clear that had he known in the beginning that this is what his life would become, he would have left. It's a poignant, yet brutal view into the perspective of a person that loves someone who is sick.
On a personal level and taking the liberty of speaking on behalf of all people who have a debilitating disease, watching that scene was a validation of so many of our guilt feelings and insecurities.
I could be strong while watching Maggie's hands tremble as she tried to open a bottle of medication. Or when she poured herself a drink and it sloshed over the side of the glass.
We watch those things and we can relate. We know how frustrating it is. We know the inner dialogue she's having because we've had it a thousand times too. We're okay, most of the time, with handling our illness. What hurts us most is watching what it does to those we love.
My favorite quote from the movie: "Sometimes the things you want the most don't happen and what you least expect happens. I don't know - you meet thousands of people and none of them really touch you. And then you meet one person and your life is changed forever."
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