slightly silly: overboard

"it's a hell of a day at sea, sir"

i have a confession to make—and i totally own my terrible taste in movies—one of my favorite movies of all time is overboard starring real life couple kurt russell and goldie hawn. i can't explain why i love this movie so much, it feels almost anti-feminist for me to like it as much as i do. the movie is filled with tropes and stereotypes galore.

plus the plot in general makes absolutely no sense. rich woman is condescending to backwoods hick and then when she washes ashore as an amnesiac he falsely claims to be her husband as petty revenge and then mistreats her until she falls in love with him and chooses to stay with him even when her memories come back. i mean, it is a garry marshall movie, so take what you will from that.

you have to wonder who was in the pitch meeting that greenlit this movie, right? and it did totally bomb at the box office. because how do you word of mouth this? everything about this movie is preposterous except that goldie hawn and kurt russell are kind of magical together. but then this movie was on television every single week during my teenage years. and somehow it became one of those movies that i just can't help watching over and over again. and it doesn't matter what point i start watching it, though usually it's when the goldie takes revenge on some of her ill-treatment and sprays kurt and his friend with the hose while her hands are stuck to two plates.

yes, you read that sentence correctly. that actually happens in the movie.

still, there's something about movies from the 80s. i feel like they took place in their own heightened reality and that makes them perfect escapist fare. even though there are tons of problems with plot and pacing in this movie, i can't help but think of as comfort food. i know that it's not going to improve my mind or worldview, but i will feel happy at the end. and in the end the search for happiness is all that matters. right?

grade: ♥♥♥♥♥ out of ♥♥♥♥♥♥