How to Turn Life Into an Adventure?
Discovering the True Nature of Adventure through Romancing the Stone
“Adventure is not outside; it is within.” — David Grayson / George Eliot
What did he mean?
Let’s look at the film Romancing the Stone (1984) directed by Robert Zemeckis, written by Diane Thomas, and produced by Michael Douglas. The story is about novelist Joan Wilder (Kathleen Turner). Her novels about independent women’s adventures are selling very successfully, although she never leaves New York City and barely her apartment. For Joan, novels are a way to create a life that she would like but will never manage.
Joan dreams of meeting and falling in love with a man resembling the heroic male characters from her writing. Joan’s friend and publisher Gloria Horne (Holland Taylor) tries to introduce her to men but to no avail.
Joan has a sister, Elaine, who lives in Colombia. Elaine’s husband Eduardo somehow got a mysterious map but then he was killed. Elaine sends it to Joan in New York. The Deputy Commander of the secret police Colonel Zolo (Manuel Ojeda) wants to receive this map. For that, he goes to New York and while Joane and Gloria are at the bar, Zolo tries to break into her apartment. But he is discovered by Joane’s apartment building’s superintendent, and Zolo kills him.
The map is also being hunted by two antiquities smugglers Ira (Zack Norman) and Ralph (Danny DeVito). They take Joan’s sister hostage and force Joan to bring them a map. Joan decides to deliver the map to them in Cartagena. Her publisher said that Joan is completely unsuited to such matters, which is justified but in vain. Zolo follows Joan to Colombia after failing to obtain the map from her in New York.
Joan arrives in Colombia and, at Zolo’s prompting, takes a bus to another city. The bus crashes in an accident and Zolo orders Joan at gunpoint to give him the map. At this moment Jack T. Colton (Michael Douglas) appears. He is an American bird hunter living in Colombia. Jack saves Joan from Zodo and from this moment their adventure begins.
As with many romantic stories, this also begins with a conflict. The guy and the girl are very different. Jack agrees to accompany her to the place where she meets with the kidnappers for $450. Joan: “Do you ever think about something besides money?”. Jack: “Yeah, women.” However, as they go through the ups and downs together, Jack and Joan begin to understand each other and fall in love. Colton’s dream is to save up for a sailboat and leave Colombia so he can travel the world. The map can help with it since it indicates the place where the treasure is hidden.
The movie finale is great: Colton’s yacht arrives on a trailer right at the entrance to Joanna’s house. She gets on board and they go to the Ocean, as if floating through the city. It looks surreal. A most brilliant idea, a break from the mold. The music is good, although not particularly memorable, but something from the 80s. It’s a good period for a movie, more optimistic than the 90s films.
Conclusion
What is an adventure? This is not a room in a five-star hotel. This is a road full of dangers you don’t know how they will end. This is the great attraction of adventure. Only a few people understand this. The maximum that people are willing to do is take a cruise in the Caribbean or go on safaris in Africa.
It means they create almost entirely planned actions rather than adventures. It’s not what you can choose for yourself. Adventure is when you let an unknown road lead you. This feeling cannot be bought with money. What stops people? It’s uncertainty.
It’s strange: everyone loves change in life but hates the instability that accompanies change. Everyone loves adventure and doesn’t dislike the discomfort that comes with it. Everyone loves plans. But adventure is the opposite of plan. A plan is safety, predictability, and boredom. Adventure is the unknown, surprise, and new knowledge.
It’s noteworthy that adventures are negative only when compared to a plan. A person has certain expectations or preferences and when events contradict this, he perceives it negatively. If you don’t make plans, then there will be less negativity at least.
A specific psychological flaw is to equate fear with bad. But this is also true as pleasant equates to good. But in this case, smoking and drugs would be recommended to everyone. Walking along the road of Destiny, you may not get to where you planned but new places can be much more interesting and useful.
Romantic relationships are also an adventure. However, it may start not as a meeting with a wonderful stranger in Manhattan, but as a night call from your sister asking for help.
“A relationship is an adventure, not something you own. The moment you see it that way is the moment you can truly begin enjoying every new discovery.” — Mandy Hale
Additional information
The genre is action-adventure romantic comedy.
The budget was $10 million and the box office was $115.1 million.
Award wins:
Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture (Musical or Comedy).
Golden Globe Award for Best Actress (Musical or Comedy) Kathleen Turner
Therefore the movie can be considered very successful in both measures (critics and audience).
I will try to assess the main parameters of the film that seem important to me using a 1–10 point scale.
Scores
Main Idea 8
Selection of Actors 8
Technical execution 8
Soundtrack 7
Finale 10
Total 7.6
Thanks for your time.
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