Gone Girl, the movie is soon to be released, well, in a week to be precise and I reserved the book again in my library and hope to reread it before I go watch the movie. My memory is pretty bad when it comes to remembering books and movies. Its a good thing because I can watch a movie or read a book over and over again without getting bored, kinda like the guy in Memento. But sometimes, I do remember specific things that stood out about a movie or a book. And the now-infamous Cool Girl passage is one of them. Here's the excerpt:
Men always say that as the defining compliment, don’t they? She’s a cool girl. Hot and understanding. Cool Girls never get angry; they only smile in a chagrined, loving manner and let their men do whatever they want. Go ahead, shit on me, I don’t mind, I’m the Cool Girl.
Men actually think this girl exists. Maybe they’re fooled because so many women are willing to pretend to be this girl. For a long time Cool Girl offended me. I used to see men – friends, coworkers, strangers – giddy over these awful pretender women, and I’d want to sit these men down and calmly say: You are not dating a woman, you are dating a woman who has watched too many movies written by socially awkward men who’d like to believe that this kind of woman exists and might kiss them. I’d want to grab the poor guy by his lapels or messenger bag and say: The bitch doesn’t really love chili dogs that much – no one loves chili dogs that much! And the Cool Girls are even more pathetic: They’re not even pretending to be the woman they want to be, they’re pretending to be the woman a man wants them to be. Oh, and if you’re not a Cool Girl, I beg you not to believe that your man doesn’t want the Cool Girl. It may be a slightly different version – maybe he’s a vegetarian, so Cool Girl loves seitan and is great with dogs; or maybe he’s a hipster artist, so Cool Girl is a tattooed, bespectacled nerd who loves comics. There are variations to the window dressing, but believe me, he wants Cool Girl, who is basically the girl who likes every fucking thing he likes and doesn’t ever complain. (How do you know you’re not Cool Girl? Because he says things like: “I like strong women.” If he says that to you, he will at some point fuck someone else. Because “I like strong women” is code for “I hate strong women.”)”
I waited patiently-years-for the pendulum to swing the other way, for men to start reading Jane Austen, learn how to knit, pretend to love cosmos, organize scrapbook parties, and make out with each other while we leer. And then we’d say, Yeah, he’s a Cool Guy.
But it never happened. Instead, women across the nation colluded in our degradation! Pretty soon Cool Girl became the standard girl. Men believed she existed- she wasn’t just a dreamgirl one in a million. Every girl was supposed to be this girl, even if you weren’t, then something was wrong with you.
― Gillian Flynn, Gone GirlI will have to say that the ‘Cool Girl’ chapter in this book is one of the best things I’ve read in a long time. It made me think of how we, as women subconsciously create a person in our head based on what we see on TV or in movies. We see something and think that's what is expected of us and do it. This is not to say, all women are alike. But, we have been guilty of doing it sometime or other. As women, we put on different acts unintentionally or sometimes intentionally. This relatability with the characters in the novel is what makes this book very interesting, Gone Girl is breezy, witty, relatable yet dark and twisted.
I can't wait to watch the movie to see how well they have made the words in the book come to life. And it helps that the trailer looks pretty impressive, so impressive infact that the husby is interested in watching it too! Are you looking forward to the movie?
Pic taken from here
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