Words: 1367
Fools rush in 1. Summary of the Film Returning from one job site with a large spearfish, Alex learns from his close friend Jeff that he doesn’t want to go to Japan for his next assignment, but to Las Vegas. The timing will allow them both to return to Manhattan and manage another new site there in the Big Apple. So it’s off to Las Vegas for Alex Whitman, and during one of his early sojourns into a Mexican restaurant he meets Isabel. They find themselves in a casual night of passion. Three months later Isabel went to Alex’s home to tell him that she is pregnant because of their one-night-stand.
Alex chases Isabel to say he really didn’t know how to react in the circumstance but he would like to do what is right. Isabel convinced him to come their family dinner and meet her family. The family dinner is tense and musical yet it ended magically when Alex held an infant that made Isabel fall further in love with him. Alex is infatuated with the large family and on the way home tries to explain how during the day he was in charge of his life and knew exactly what he wanted and where he was going. However sometime between his tuna melt for lunch and her aunt’s tamales his whole life no longer made any sense.
He felt that his chance to meet the right person was probably missed because he didn’t pay attention while standing in a dry cleaning line. Alex stumbles, and poetically tells Isabel “that she is everything he never knew he always wanted, and it has something to do with the rest of his life and they should get married right away”. They marry that evening in a gaudy Vegas chapel, with an Elvis impersonator as a witness, and check into a honeymoon suite at one of the casinos. Problems soon arise as Isabel knew that Alex really lives in Manhattan. Alex’s parents were told by a lifelong friend to visit Alex.
They thought that Isabel is Alex’s very good housekeeper. They soon learn that Isabel is their new daughter-in-law. More cultural clashes go off when the Alex’s parents meet Isabel’s on a hot day on Lake Mead. Spanish ghetto blasters battle with Presbyterian logic in a wonderful cultural confrontation on just where the baby should be raised. This is a minor conflict compared to the couples own effort to get to know each other. Work, long days, schedules and family traditions create a lot of issues for the couple. Eventually the elegant club was completed, and the big boss spills the beans about Isabel seeing her later that week in New
York City. The happenings results to a conflict between the couple. Isabel misleads Alex about the well being of their little one during a hospital visit. She split for her grandmother’s home in Mexico, and Alex packs and returns to Manhattan. Divorce papers are served, hearts are broken, and no one is really telling the truth about how they really feel. Alex has learned to recognize signs, pictures of the desert southwest, Chihuahuas, religious hints, and a haunting song that forces both parties to ‘Wonder’ about the other.
Alex bolts Manhattan for central Mexico, Isabel leaves central Mexico for Las Vegas, and the two meet at the state line on Hoover Dam. The baby comes, the divorce becomes final at midnight, they reconcile, and a baby girl gets to attend a beautiful wedding of her parents with all the families on a canyon bluff. 2. Who is your favorite character in the film? Why? In the film there is one character that had stand out with me, the character played by Salma Hayek. The characters name is Isabel Fuentes. Her character became my favorite because of the kind of person she is.
I like her personality of being vocal about her feelings. She is frank of whatever she wants to tell. At the same time her character had shown sweetness, care and love to her partner, Alex Whitman. Isabel Fuentes had shown courage to show how she feels for the person. I was also amazed of how the actress, Salma Hayek played the role. The role was very suited to her and she played it very well. 3. What is your favorite scene? Why? My favorite scene is the flashing of signs to Alex that he must see Isabel. It is good to see how destiny shows that two people are just meant for each other.
In this scene it was justified that many things are meant to happen. The scene had shown how fate links two people with different signs. Truly when destiny speaks, there’s nothing we can do but just to follow it in order for us not to regret in the end. The scene had catched my attention because of how the character of Alex tried to cease the chance in order to be with his lady love, Isabel. 4. On phenomenology of love, how love is defined in the film? Explain briefly. In the film, love was defined when Isabel Fuentes (Salma Hayek) said “Love is a gift, Alex, not an obligation. To understand further the definition given, we must first know what “gift” and “obligation” means. A gift is something that is received without anything in return on the other hand; obligation is a duty that is required to be done because of any social force. Therefore, love must be given freely and when it is done, one should not expect something in return. Love is heartedly given that make’s it proper to most of the people. 5. Using Husserl’s three steps of Phenomenology, Explain the Phenomenology of Love. The first step is epoche or bracketing my natural attitude towards the object, love.
I will suspend my biases, prejudices, judgments, and opinions, whether they are favorable or unfavorable to love. I will neither accept nor reject them. I will start to think and reflect. I will try to see the experience as a disinterested spectator. I will therefore put aside my opinion that love oftentimes results to a broken heart; that is meant to be hurtful. I will also suspend my opinion that love is a magical feeling share by two people. Now I am ready to proceed to the eidetic reduction. I will take away the non-essentials of love; I will reduce the experience of love into eidos.
I will try to answer the question: “what makes love, love? ” Is it mutual to two persons? Oftentimes, it is mutual between two persons. What really love means? Completely relative to the individual’s definition of love, people have different understandings for what the word means, can you fall in love without a concrete definition or understanding of love? Love is most likely a myriad of emotions that are often unique to the individual. Quantifying a subjective term doesn’t necessarily help. The question also assumes love exists.
Showing love without the intention of asking something in return is a manifestation of selflessness. So selflessness is the essence of love. I may show how much I love the person by giving all she needs. It is the essence of selflessness that the experience of love is justified. This leads me to transcendental reduction, the awareness of myself as a part of the experience of love. I become conscious to myself as the source of validity to the experience. The experience of love makes me conscious of my subjectivity and that I am consciousness among other consciousness, without his I would be nothing. It is the presence of other consciousness that I become conscious to myself. Without consciousness, I would not be myself, there would be no love. So the experience of love is not just subjective but an intersubjective experience. The experience of love is giving rather than receiving and that justifies selflessness. Once I’ve gone through with the steps, I realized that I have new way of looking at the experience of love and that this experience now looks different to me, or present in me in a new way.