{"id":1730,"date":"2008-02-26T12:16:21","date_gmt":"2008-02-26T12:16:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/idolchatter\/2008\/02\/definitely-maybe-and-other-mov.html"},"modified":"2008-02-26T12:16:21","modified_gmt":"2008-02-26T12:16:21","slug":"definitely-maybe-and-other-mov","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2008\/02\/definitely-maybe-and-other-mov.html","title":{"rendered":"Definitely, Maybe&#8217; is a New Sort of Second Chance Flick"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"defmaybe_idol.jpg\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/import\/defmaybe_idol.jpg\" width=\"216\" height=\"165\" style=\"float:right;margin: 5px\">I finally saw &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.definitelymaybemovie.com\/\" target=\"_new\">Definitely, Maybe<\/a>,&#8221; starring Ryan Reynolds as a just-divorced and lonely Dad (who turns out to be a great romantic lead) and the ever-adorable Abigail Breslin as his daughter who longs to fix his broken love life. It&#8217;s actually a really sweet romance that manages to not get syrupy in the process.<br \/>\nBut seeing this particular film, coupled with my chance Netflixing last week of &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.sonypictures.com\/homevideo\/catchandrelease\/index.html\" target=\"_new\">Catch and Release<\/a>&#8221; (starring Jennifer Garner as an almost-widow, whose fiance dies just before their wedding day), and the recent popularity of the movie-that-I-hated but that everyone else seemed to like, &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/psiloveyoumovie.warnerbros.com\/\" target=\"_new\">P.S. I Love You<\/a>&#8221; (starring Hilary Swank, also as a widow, who spends the entire film mooning over her late husband), I got to thinking about the &#8220;second chance, starting over&#8221; themes in romantic movies lately.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><br \/>\nStarting over&#8211;having an almost out of body, out of time religious epiphany that has a born again kind of effect once a person returns to &#8220;real life&#8221;&#8211;is nothing new in the movies. The classics of this genre are most notably &#8220;It&#8217;s a Wonderful Life&#8221; and &#8220;Scrooge,&#8221; which most of us see either in on a stage if not rerun on television at some point each holiday season. The basic storyline: Man doesn&#8217;t value all he has&#8211;is so focused on or broken by work that he is missing out on the good things in life&#8211;so he must see the light and change.<br \/>\nBut this recent trend in movies like &#8220;Definitely, Maybe&#8221; has to do with reckoning with the brokenness left behind by love lost, love taken, or love messed-up, and then &#8220;coming back&#8221; ready, &#8220;born again&#8221; if you will, for the new life that new love offers. What&#8217;s prompting this sort of romantic redemption flick? Is it the high rate of divorce in this country? Does it speak to a typically unacknowledged fantasy of getting to start over without the stigma of divorce (as with &#8220;P.S. I Love You&#8221; and &#8220;Catch and Release&#8221;)? Just noticing a trend and wondering about it &#8230;<br \/>\nRegardless, &#8220;Definitely, Maybe&#8221; is worth seeing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I finally saw &#8220;Definitely, Maybe,&#8221; starring Ryan Reynolds as a just-divorced and lonely Dad (who turns out to be a great romantic lead) and the ever-adorable Abigail Breslin as his daughter who longs to fix his broken love life. It&#8217;s actually a really sweet romance that manages to not get syrupy in the process. But&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":105,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movies"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Definitely, Maybe&#039; is a New Sort of Second Chance Flick<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2008\/02\/definitely-maybe-and-other-mov.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Definitely, Maybe&#039; is a New Sort of Second Chance Flick\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I finally saw &#8220;Definitely, Maybe,&#8221; starring Ryan Reynolds as a just-divorced and lonely Dad (who turns out to be a great romantic lead) and the ever-adorable Abigail Breslin as his daughter who longs to fix his broken love life. It&#8217;s actually a really sweet romance that manages to not get syrupy in the process. But&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2008\/02\/definitely-maybe-and-other-mov.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Idol Chatter\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-02-26T12:16:21+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/idolchatter\/files\/import\/defmaybe_idol.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Donna Freitas\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Definitely, Maybe' is a New Sort of Second Chance Flick","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2008\/02\/definitely-maybe-and-other-mov.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Definitely, Maybe' is a New Sort of Second Chance Flick","og_description":"I finally saw &#8220;Definitely, Maybe,&#8221; starring Ryan Reynolds as a just-divorced and lonely Dad (who turns out to be a great romantic lead) and the ever-adorable Abigail Breslin as his daughter who longs to fix his broken love life. 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