Something Borrowed

Something Borrowed is about two people, Rachel and Dex, who meet in law school and fall in love, but never admit it to each other.  Due to Rachel's selfless nature, she doesn't object to when Dex starts dating her best friend Darcey.  Darcey and Dex get engaged.  While they're engaged, Dex and Rachel reveal how they used to feel about each other and they see those feelings are still strongly present.  In this love triangle, Rachel tries to be true to her heart while also admitting her fear and guilt of hurting her best friend.
 
1. Reiss's Wheel Theory of Love

The theory describes how people go through four stages of love: rapport, self revelation, mutual dependency, and personality need fulfillment. Dex and Rachel meet while in law school.  They become really good friends during their time in law school and maintain close contact because Dex gets engaged with Rachel's best friend.  During their engagement, Dex and Rachel sleep together.  They soon see how much they can confide in each other and how much more they can be themselves when they're together.

2. Lee's Styles of Loving

This theory describes six different types of loving: eros, mania, ludus, storge, agape, and pragma.  The movie displays different types of styles with the various couples in the movie.  Rachel and Dex are first drawn to each other by eros love.  Storge is displayed in the friendship between Ethan (Rachel's best friend) and Rachel; at least, it's displayed with how Rachel feels toward Ethan.  Ethan displays eros love towards Rachel, but he cares so much about her that he recognizes she'll never feel the same about him. Rachel displays a combination of storge and agape towards her best friend Darcey; she trusts and respects her and she was willing to sacrifice her love for Dex because of how much Darcey meant to her.

Friends with Benefits

Friends with Benefits
The movie friends with benefits staring Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake are practicing Sternberg’s Triangular Theory in the beginning of the movie. They are simply friends, there relationship is intimate but has no passion or commitment involved (liking triangle). They decide that they want to try and add sex to their friendship, with no commitment or strings attached, just like they see in movies.
They then adopt Lee’s Ludos style of love- very playful and casual. The sexual relationship is all fun and games with no commitment. They often make "booty calls" to eachother. However, in the end of the movie they fall for each other and some might argue that they have a healthy normal relationship.

Love Theories in Amélie

"Amélie" is a movie about the childhood and adulthood of a young woman living in France. Throughout the movie, Amélie embarks on many small adventures in her quest to secretly help those around her.  However, she never tries to establish close relationships with anyone. One day at the train station she sees Nino, a man who ultimately changes her views on love.

Attachment Theory:

Amélie is a perfect example of Avoidance. Scenes from her childhood reveal that her father never showed her affection. As as child, her best friend was a fish and she spent most of her time playing alone.  When Amélie is older, she continues to have difficultly forming close relationships. When she first sees Nino at the train station, she is obviously interested in him but makes no effort in trying to meet him because she is afraid. It isn't until the end of the movie when Amélie realizes that she should no longer push people away.

Lee's Styles of Love:

When Amélie and Nino meet at the train station, they experience Eros, love at first sight. Though she is shy, Amélie also expresses Ludas love by obsessing over seeing Nino again.  She even devises a plan for him to find her. At the end of the movie, Ludas love is displayed again with clips of the couple spending a great amount of time together.

Romantic/Ero

The film Maid in Manhattan is about a single parent mother names Marisa who lives in the Bronx. Marisa makes her living as a maid in a five star Manhattan hotel.

Romantic from Sternberg’s Love Types is one theory that explains the two main characters relationship in the film. After Marisa tries on a guest expensive outfit, New York Senate candidate Chris walks in on her and assumes she is a guest at the hotel. Immediately charmed, Chris asks Marisa to join him for a walk in Central Park, assuming she is Caroline. Marisa manages to join Chris from the afternoon, along with her son Ty. Chris is stunned by Marisa’s beauty and sensible personality, as well as Ty’s interest in politics.

Ero from Lee’s Style of Love also applies to Chris and Marisa’s relationship. Chris must evade the paparazzi looking for a story on his new romance. Marisa must conceal her real identity as a maid from Chris due to their different social status. After Chris anxious search to reunite with “Caroline”, he is spotted her and Ty walking down the road. Chris invited Marisa to a benefit. The film rolls into a modern version of the Cinderella tale. The Cinderella story goes into effect as the hotel workers happily get Marisa ready for the benefit (ball). 

The Notebook and styles of love intertwined

The movie The Notebook is about A poor and passionate young man who falls in love with a rich young woman and gives her a sense of freedom. They soon are separated by their social differences.


One of John Lee's style of love called Storge love can best exemplify the love story that unfolds between Ally and Noah. This style of love is said to occur over the passage of time. In the movie it was Noah who had an attraction and a crush on Ally. She did not like him at first. However Noah won her over with his charm and gained her friendship. The relationship was able to prosper and continue because there was consistency, commitment intimacy and comfortability. The couple enjoyed each other companionship and doing activities together.


Another theory known as Reiss's Wheel theory notes that love develops over the course of four main stages; 1)Building rapport 2)Self Revelation 3) Mutual Dependency 4) Personality Need Fulfillment


Establishing Rapport with someone else is the first step in building a relationship. People usually meet people who live near them, work with them or share the same interest and the same activities. After rapport is established. People then feel comfortable about disclosing themselves. As the relationship becomes intimate, the couple might be dependent and expect certain things from their partner. Last stage is personality need fulfillment, where the couple might need to make decisions together to support one another's goals and ambition.


The scenario in the movie shows that Noah met Ally through mutual friends and established a friendship first. As time progress they felt comfortable with each other and revealed themselves and then introduced each other to their parents. Over the course of more time the relationship became more emotionally and sexually intimate. Lastly Noah had a dream oh building a dream house from bottom up for Ally ( the love of his life). He buys her art materials and support her skills and talent and dreams even though she thought of her painting as foolishness.

The film Enchanted, is based on several classic Disney fairytales. It takes place in modern-day New York, where the fairytale princess is sent to the real world by the evil queen. After her arrival in the real world, her views about on life and love after meeting a lawyer.

Early in the film, it displays Lee's Style of Love: Eros. The princess is singing when the prince overhears and is enchanted by her voice. When the two finally met, the prince sings his half of the song and the two instantly fall in love. Shortly after their meeting, the decide that they are meant to be together and plan to wed.

Reiss's Wheel Theory of Love applies to the two main characters of the film, the princess and the lawyer. Throughout the film, the two go through each stage of Reiss's theory. At first, the lawyer is resisting getting to know anything about her, but eventually the two start to learn about each other. Eventually getting advice from each other, exchanges hopes/ambitions, and becoming dependent on each other by the end of the film.

Empty Love, and Ludus Style of Loving

The film Crazy, Stupid Love displays scenarios in different relationships in which can be labeled by different theories of love. One relationship can be characterized by a subcategory of Steingberg's Triangular Theory of Love, empty love. This style states that empty love is a style in which commitment is found but passion and intimacy do not exist; this relationship is seen as business-like since ending the relationship becomes too much of a hassle. A husband and his wife find themselves in a long term relationship which is broken apart when the wife decides to find intimacy and passion in another person.  Both of these characters have children and a long relationshiop history behind them, but a silent dinner scene between the couple implicitly reflects a scenario in which empty love is found.

Another character in the film begins as a single attractive man, often engaging in playful love (Ludus), one of Lee's styles of loving.  The Ludus style of loving reflects a state in which a relationship is almost purely sexual without commitment, intimacy, or a second date in most cases.  This man is often seen at a bar accompanied by many beautiful women and usually ends the night with them escorting him back to his home.  Because of a past relationship, he chooses not to commit to one single person and preffers to engage in casual play rather than build an emotional connection.