Well, well, well look where we are again – the ‘90s. More specifically, we’re talking about the ‘90s movie crushes this week because author James Flynn picked one hell of a character from a 1994 film that truly slayed. We’ll get more to that later this week, but James’ crush did inspire me to head down a more grown-up path because usually if you told me to talk about a ‘90s crush from a movie I’d lean towards JTT or Devon Sawa, but since James’ crush comes from a movie that definitely wasn’t for kids – that’s where I’ll go too and because of that, I’m talking about my obsession with ‘Pretty Woman’ as a kindergartner since I wanted nothing more than to have Richard Gere and that brown and white polka dot dress.
Back when the Sexistentialist stopped by to talk about Luke Skywalker, I’d mentioned ‘Pretty Woman.’ That’s because as kids our parents really didn’t shield us from “adult” content. Which, thinking back…was the story of a prostitute appropriate for a five-year-old? Some may say no, but my mom popped that VHS on, and I was enthralled because at its core, it’s basically one of the dozen (definitely more than that) movies to just do a play on ‘My Fair Lady’ which I guess is my jam. After all, I went on to love ‘She’s All That’ and the whole Tai plot from ‘Clueless,’ even though as a whole that movie was based on Jane Austen’s ‘Emma.’
Anyways, ‘Pretty Woman’ was so much my jam that I spent an entire summer straight strutting around in nothing more than a bathing suit and cowboy boots. Trust, if my body ever gets close to Julia Roberts in that movie, I’m rocking that classic working girl ensemble from the start of the movie. However, while I did love just about everything about Roberts’ Vivian, I was just as enamored with Richard Gere’s Edward Lewis. I mean, he was willing to just toss money as someone. I was living in a double-wide in a shit town. How could I not want a guy like that? Of course, I had zero idea what the fuck a hooker actually was or why he was initially giving her the money but…hey, I had only learned to tie my own shoes by that time.
What I did know was that Edward was charming, loaded, and handsome as fuck. Basically a real-life Prince Eric a la ‘The Little Mermaid.’ Which, if you listened to me on ‘Life’s But a Song’ talking about ‘A Goofy Movie,’ then you also heard me talk about I never could hate on Ariel for doing what she did for that royal D. Okay, from one fairy tale to another, ‘Pretty Woman’ does end with this grand romantic gesture that to this day warms my Antarctic heart. Every time I watch my love for Mr. Lewis is ignited all over again and I’m instantly taken back to that summer of ‘Pretty Woman’ obsession, and I think that’ll always be the case.
Crushgasm 