I wanna be in pictures ...

The vast majority of people, at least in the United States, love a happy ending. Hollywood knows this, which is why 95 percent of most movies have the happy ending. They'll distort the original story, novel or work to have theater-goers leave the cinema pleased with how things turn out.

This is especially true with romantic comedies. Just about everyone wants to see the guy get the girl, to see the girl get the guy, to have everything work out so the two can live happily ever after. It doesn't matter that she cheated on him with his best friend, or that he lied to her from the beginning. Nowhere is there more forgiveness than a romantic comedy — Jesus would have a hard time turning the other cheek so often.

Misunderstandings are always cleared up and resolved. The most bitter, cruel things said in the heat of the moment are forgotten. The loveable but not so attractive guy finds love. The good-hearted girl finds her soul mate.

Even when the end is tragic, it's ameliorated. The woman dies, but the man realizes that her love for him has redeemed him, and that he'll be able to love again. The man is crippled, but the woman still wants to marry him and be with him forever.

It really is till death do they part. Wedding vows remain sancrosact. And even if they don't, they work things out.

My problem is that I'm a romantic. But I'm also a realist (though most call it pessimism). I know that had most of these instances happened in REAL life instead of in REEL life, half the time the guy wouldn't have stood a chance from the get-go. And yet I still can't help hoping. There is a lot more pain and heartache and strife and rancor, and almost never is there anything even remotely close to a happy ending. He doesn't come back to her. She doesn't run to the airport to catch him before the plane leaves. The intervening man or woman never reveals that they lied about the whole thing, that it really was a misunderstanding.

In real life, people fall out of love, and usually it is one person, and the other person is blindsided by that revelation. Flabbersgasted. Stunned. Unbelieving. And it doesn't matter what the other person does, he or she can't change the one person's feelings. There may be flashes of hope, but almost always that's only in the mind of the person who's no longer loved. Oh, the one person still LOVES the other person; he or she just isn't IN LOVE with that other person.

So why do we all buy into the bullshit that Hollywood peddles? How are we able to suspend disbelief so easily during an hour-and-a-half long movie? Why do we sigh with relief when the guy gets the girl? Why do we cry tears of happiness when the girl gets the guy?

I want to write and direct a movie. I've tentatively titled it, "I Don't Want to Ruin Our Friendship," or "I Love You, But Not In That Way," or "You're Like a Brother to Me," or something along those lines. The movie will be about a guy getting shot down again and again by women who should be lucky to have a guy like him — but he's not handsome or athletic. He makes a succession of women he meets laugh, he treats them with respect and kindness, he's thoughtful and loving. And everyone tells him how he's a great guy and they wish they could meet someone just like him (but not him), and that how he's going to make "some" woman very happy one day, but not with them. They'll want to remain his friend and he will graciously agree, and he will die a little inside everytime one of the women friends introduce him to the man/men they end up with, and he'll be their shoulder to cry on when those men treat them wrong, hit them, cheat on them, etc. But they'll keep going back to the same kind of guy.

Until he meets the perfect woman, the woman who meshes with him like a glove on a hand. It's so obvious they belong together, that they complement each other perfectly, that they should have the type of relationship everyone dreams of but never thinks can happen.

All the way up to the part where she tells him: "I love you, I do ... but not in that way."

Random Guam Fact Of The Day:
• Guam and Micronesia comprise the second-most popular wedding destination for Japanese, behind Hawaii. About 52 percent of all overseas Japanese weddings are in Hawaii, but almost 30 percent are in Guam and Micronesia.