On the "nice" guy representation in media

Recently, I was watching a movie. It was a sad love story of a kind-hearted thug and a lone, stone-faced bank cashier who he was trying to recover debt from. After learning about the circumstances surrounding her debt, he pities her and tries to help. Somehow, in the process of coming up with different plans to help her, the one he finally lands on is one in which she goes out with him multiple times and that replaces her debt. That was a totally sensible exchange in his eyes and a good segway into romance from the writer’s pov. This trope actually not uncommon but with the directorial elements of this movie leaning towards realism, it leaves one questions.

What intrigued me the most however is the directorial intent of him staring at her sheepishly everytime like he was seeing stars. It is supposed to convey to us that he falls in love with her at first sight. We knew nothing about that woman except that he was stunned at their first meeting by her beauty, apparently. To equate getting stunned by beauty to falling in love at first sight is a reach that adult me thinks we've let go too far in society.

Moreover, someone like him should not be that moved by beauty, according to the movie's premise. He probably sees pretty, poor women all the time. He is shown to also patronise and be friendly with a sex worker who is conventionally pretty. The conclusion is thus that the packaging and allure of her beauty is something different, something more “worthy.” Something he might consider above his class but she just carries it around wandering the slums. He's in awe. He sees this as falling in love at first sight and we've all taken his word for it. A problem.

This reminds me of several essays I've read and heard about a woman's currency in our society being beauty as opposed to the man's fiat currency. It leads me down a more interesting line of thought about how this is an awfully convenient "Mr. Nice guy" template and how he might turn out if she leaves him or looses that beauty. In this movie, they plot required stuff happens; falling in love and the whole romantic tragedy dramatics which brings up several scenarios begging for analysis by the way. However, the portrayal of the male lead in order to advance the plot leads to the culmination of issues that I think love cannot explain away. It's that way with cinema where your perception of the hero and villain changes as you rewatch it over several moments of your life. So back to the original course...

All those "nice guys gone rogue" are all everywhere. After you notice one,you can't help but notice more. Nowadays, I can say I encounter at least one tweet thread from a "nice" guy variant on twitter. As I've heard, people on Reddit might have it worse. Each of their back stories sound a little like this:

"Wealthy people were entitled to beauty and he believed that as the way of his world. It gave him something to look forward to,to aspire for, to drive him. Ever since the first time he set his eyes on her, he knew. That he was so lucky to have found a woman like this just wandering around his vicinity and more amazingly giving him any attention despite him having grossly inadequate social currency for it. He thanked the stars for his luck. The more attention she gave him, the more hopeful he got. This woman who he does not deserve by his arbitrary standards wants to be his("wants him" should be more accurate but he considers both actions interchangeable), he wonders in awe. He "loves" her so much more because of this. The best of women are really the ones who don't know how pretty they are, he concludes.

If she just becomes his, he thinks he would cherish her for life. He proceeds to ignore everything she says, every neon sign as he's already placed her on a pedestal. He dismisses every misunderstanding as benign. It doesn't matter whether he doesn't like some parts of her or she complained about other parts of his. She's a conventional beauty. The kind only rich men get. He bagged a “10”, there's no way he's leaving her.

One day she might leave him for a man that he unfortunately unconsciously agrees that she should have been with in the first place. A man he thinks has adequate currency that correlates to “owning" her. He withstood everything because he thought that was the sacrifice it took to get your own dream on a platter without reaching where you'd expect to be to have it. He gets upset. It doesn't matter why she left him. It pains him that she's gone to where even he agrees she belongs but there's more...

His fear intensifies. He might never make it like that man she's with right now. He might never meet another woman like her. This means his dream is gone after he's unfortunately got a taste of how good it feels. All that's left is intense hatred and loathing.

So he directs it towards her for some reason (instead of the one who stole his dream). He curses her for existing in his vicinity in the first place only to not stay forever. He cannot wish her well. He also believes no one would treat her as well as him (considering that she's his dream). He reasons that she’s the problem. If she couldn't find happiness with a person who saw her as HIS (dream), there's no way she would find it with another. He hope she hurts. He feels that she deserves it. She becomes a demonised woman that hurt men and knowingly uses her beauty as currency. He projects and wishes that she could be cheated on, even battered until that Jezebel beauty is wiped off her face. He will then proceed attempts to dehumanise and slander her.

He will dream of lofty heights. Heights that house him in some fantasized riches and power. In that dream he sees begging on her knees, crying for forgiveness but it'll be too late. With zero iota of irony, he reasons he'll be surrounded by many women like her past self. She won't be special anymore. He can now get them in multitudes. He was her chance at love and she lost it. Sadly, she must face the "consequences."

I call it the "nice" guy's wetdream. A conventional beauty who will love him despite everything (everything doing a lot of heavy lifting). A seemingly saintly story that mixes fantasy and delusion . They hold on so strongly to it and run with it. It's an interesting spectacle to observe. Variants of it have also seeped into pop culture songs. Songs like Locked Away by Adam Levine, Davido's Aye etc etc. These songs also sometimes interestingly allude to an attempt to let go of this harmful worldview, but only for the woman, not voluntarily.

I don't know how I feel about this character variant being portrayed in romance movies still. Other people with stories similar the above do not necessarily turn into a ball of hatred, they evolve into other forms. Some will wallow in despair for too long and then discover therapy and healing. Others will continue to embarrass themselves over and over for even a crumb of that "love" in any way they can get it. The media can choose to show any point of view. However, highlighting the pathetic side of the character while brushing away the dangerous side is insidious media representation in my opinion. It’s even worse, if the “love of the right woman” is what is used to brush it off.

I guess I'm just in the minority of people who think we as a whole society should be more critical of the portrayal of love at first sight or love in general in media particularly its motivations and shortcomings.

PS: The title of the movie is "Man in Love", specifically the Taiwanese version.