Valentine’s Day may be filled with ulterior motives
I’m not anti-Valentine’s Day nor am I for it but I’d sure support Feb. 14 with a lot more gusto the day it becomes a national statutory holiday. Despite urban rumours that this forced day of love and affection was spurred from the cockles of some dude’s heart, the day of love is one with ulterior motives. I personally believe it was a day concocted by the same people who write those sappy lines for card stores; in other words, a make work project.
Now if one only stopped to smell the proverbial roses and not look deeper, we could end this column here and now but you know that’s not the case. If you look past the roses and dip the schnozz well into the vase of Valentine’s Day, you’ll find a hornet’s nest full of mediums all pressuring us to max out the credit cards for the greater good of love. The proof: Maybe I’ve read too many conspiracy books but let’s look at the movie industry, starting with “Top Gun.” It’s about a bunch of jet fighter pilots with cool nicknames who ride motorbikes with no helmets and would seemingly appear to be a guy’s movie. And then you hear the song “Take my Breath Away” from the soundtrack and you have to question the ‘Aqua Velva’ factor from such a flick. Was this movie really made to appeal to the testosterone of men or was it a vehicle for Berlin and their big love song? With the exception of Valentine’s Day, you never hear that song and for good reason — it stinks.
Let’s take a peek at another flick, say, “Footloose.” Kevin Bacon plays the role of a rebel that has the thin-lipped actor driving a tractor in the now famous ‘playing chicken with a tractor’ scene. By all accounts, it doesn’t seem like your typical romantic V-Day flick but then you hear ‘Almost Paradise’ by Mike Reno and Ann Wilson and you gotta wonder how such a song came to pass as you’re sitting in row two of the movie theatre with the guys from work.
“Armageddon.” Now this is a flick that suckered any man who owns a denim vest into believing this was a man’s movie. Meteors and rockets, offshore drilling and manly camaraderie, what blue blooded man wouldn’t want to see this? Even if it does have Ben Affleck in it, the main man is Bruce Willis, the king of action flicks. It’s a testosterone induced piece of Hollywood until “Don’t Wanna Miss A Thing” is blasting out of the speakers at which point the movie ushers start handing out boxes of Kleenex en masse.
And if you've got something on your mind, you can find Poncho weekday mornings on Medicine Hat's Best Rock, 105.3 Rock. You can also track him down at www.1053rock.ca or on Twitter @ponchoparker