Legally Blonde

There's always an unwritten mental list of movies that I vow to always make time to watch when it's on television, meaning that if I stumble upon it on my TV Guide and see that it's playing, I don't allow myself to change the channel.

Some include Stomp the Yard, School of Rock, Space Jam and Legally Blonde. Yes, you heard me right. Anytime any of those four films are on television, I carve out the rest of my night to recite along every single line in every single scene spoken by every single character in the film. I don't know how to explain it. You know how humans have some weird quirk about them? Well, here's mine. It's something I can't put into words.

Legally Blonde is one of my favorite movies of all time. It's easy to absorb, first of all...pretty typical storyline. A CULA (fictional college) student and sorority president Elle Woods, rich, spoiled, fashion-conscious, is dating the man of her dreams--Harvard Law School-bound Warner, who's suave, says he's more serious and aspires to become a lawyer. Just before he's about to move to Cambridge, Massachusetts, he dumps Elle telling her that if he wants to become a serious lawyer someday, he's going to have to be involved with someone a little more serious like him.

Elle takes her time being heartbroken, but soon after hatches a plan to get Warner back. Pretty simple, really--just take the LSATs, apply to Harvard Law, sign up for his classes and prove that she can be the smart, serious girlfriend who's not just some homecoming queen eye candy. That'll show him!

My favorite part of the movie was probably the sequence showing how hard Elle worked to score at least a 179 on the LSATs, and how much she sacrificed everything and left the life she knew to embark on a new one all in the hopes of winning back her ex-boyfriend who so unceremoniously dumped her. The feminist in me would be appalled, but at the same time, we forget that she's quite young in the movie. She'd be only about 21 or 22 at the most, is my guesstimate. I can only imagine how stupid and impulsive I was at 21 or 22, but also, not as smart at the same time, if that makes sense. When you get your heartbroken at that age, it changes you inside--you're extremely affected. Luckily, it doesn't last.

I guess what I liked seeing was the fact that Elle had so much passion to be successful even if it were solely about getting Warner back. But it's with that passion that shifts from mere lovesickness after being dumped, to transitioning into some serious implications of tackling one of the hardest professional fields in the world. It's not about getting Warner back anymore--an innocent woman on trial is at stake.

I started really really enjoying the movie right around the time when she says, "I'll show you how valuable Elle Woods can be" after Warner tells her she'll never be smart enough or good enough. I think it's because that's when you really start to notice that Elle's feelings for Warner start to subside, and she begins to work hard not to impress him but more so, she does it for herself. She starts doing it for her. Her heartbreak was what motivated her, but her sense of self worth was what defined her and her successes.

Her journey through law school wasn't defined by her heartbreak or the initial reason for why she came all the way to Boston; if anything it became such a small, infinitesimal part of her past that she no longer had to pay attention to. She's here for herself now, and no one else.

It's so much more than the typical "If you work hard for it you'll get it!" age-old trope to every feel-good, inspirational girl power movie. This is more so about the fact that Elle worked so hard to get something that she realized she didn't even want after all. She did that--twice. That's true character development.

Upon her first day of school after getting thrown out of her first class for not doing the reading, and then seeing Warner with his new girlfriend Veronica Kensington who belongs to some stupid country club, Elle was just about to pack up and go back home. She regrets moving to Boston. However, with the help of Paulette, the nail salon lady who ends up being her only friend, Elle decides to stick it out, and prove herself.

She sees her ex boyfriend with a new woman in all her classes throughout the semester, but it doesn't deter her. If anything, it motivates her, inspires her. She throws herself into law, keeps busy and eventually becomes the top of her class. Soon, she begins slowly forgetting the entire reason why she even went to Harvard Law, but begins throwing herself into the mindset of a lawyer for herself. Nobody else, but herself. You really start seeing it when she begins excelling in her classes.

Later, (spoiler alert for those who haven't seen the movie), she ends up on Professor Callahan's murder trial case, the defendant being a former sorority sister Brooke Wyndham, of Elle's from another campus who's accused of killing her very old husband for money. It is there you see Elle's final genius come out--all thanks to the beauty of hair care. She used her regular smarts, and her old passion to help her succeed in her new passion. And you know she didn't think of Warner for a second since she took on the case.

She ends up winning the case for her client, as a first year law student, and proves that it is the husband's daughter that actually killed him, who thought it was the defendant walking down the stairs, wanting to end her life. Brooke Wyndham is free to go, thanks to Elle's logic and smarts.

Warner ends up crawling back to Elle, after seeing her brilliant performance, telling her that "you really are the one for me." Thankfully, Elle doesn't succumb this time--she's not tempted anymore. No more feelings...she's done with his ass. Elle throws back the same line into his face, telling him that if she wants to be a serious lawyer someday, she's going to want to date someone who's not such a complete bonehead.

It is there that I cheer so hard for Elle, one final time. She's grown so much as a character because she realizes that no amount of boyfriends, or compliments or even pervy professors who gave her the case because he liked the way she looked, really, can truly define what she's set out to prove of herself. She's not just some blonde--she's not just some sorority sister--she's not just some girl that got dumped for being dumb--she's Elle Woods, and nobody else. She turned all of her vindictiveness and retribution into something that actually helped her true talents come out alive.

Her motive to move to Harvard might've been Warner, but her motive to grow out there didn't come from Warner--it came from Elle Woods and Elle Woods alone. I think that's why I like that movie so much--it's because you think the certain events in your life spur your decisions, which may happen, but you only really grow when you choose to. You can also choose to not grow.

We often times as human beings, use crisis to define our lives, to plan our next steps, the coming future. Maybe we ourselves also want to get away from something, escape, or try and get something back. We have our initial motives to change something in our lives, but with the passing of time after working towards what you originally thought you wanted, our goals become more and more shifted. That journey and process of its own where we work towards accomplishing something is what actually defines us.

Elle moved to Boston to win someone back and nothing else. No other intention. However, along the way, she also discovered her inner brilliance, and her true passion for criminal law. The recesses of Warner left the corners of her mind a long time ago. Warner wasn't important to her anymore. She focused on the work placed in front of her that she had to do alone. No man was going to get in the way of that.

And that is why, Elle Woods ends up being one of my favorite feminist characters of all time. True, she succumbed to her heartbreak and pined away for a man at the start of the movie, which is probably a feminist's number one no-no, but she turned that into something brilliant, to the point where her ex-boyfriend meant nothing to her anymore at the end, because she realizes that she's so much better than that, and she's worth so much more than that. Instead, her successes became the forefront of her identity. No longer does she have any ties left to Warner, nor any feelings. She is Elle Woods on her own.

I can only hope, that during the times of emotional heartache, that I too, can somehow become my own version of Elle someday. I will stay Gina Kim. I will chase after my goals not for vindictiveness or retribution but rather, to shift my motive to become better from gaining vengeance to doing it purely for myself because I am excited to see what I'm capable of. Elle originally improved herself to gain revenge in a weird way, or to prove herself to not be a dumb stereotypical blonde, but she realized that she didn't have to prove herself to anyone--only to Elle Woods.

And that's exactly what I plan to do this year. If it means transitioning elsewhere with new challenges, a vanished comfort zone to discover what I'm capable of once again, then so be it. I've done it before. Let's do it again. Embrace your inner brilliance, don't let unhappy events be the only thing to motivate you to make changes in your life but rather, let it shift into something completely different. Change that motive. It happened, so move on. Can't change the past. Let it go, and see what the inner you can do.

Keep staying on that right path, and your inner brilliance will come to light.