February 15: Push

Boy meets girl. Boy goes out with girl. Boy and girl break up. Boy and girl get back together. Boy marries girl. Girl has baby. This is the basic premise for what seems like every movie or TV show romance. Of course, there are different elements to each one, but for the most part, this is it. I don't mind a romantic comedy. Call me a wuss or a "Mary" (thank you, George Costanza) but I'll admit to really liking some of them. What I don't like, however, is the "giving birth scene."

Here it is: The featured couple is usually in an argument about something stupid and pointless when the girl is involuntarily forced to curl over in pain as she grabs her stomach. The guy immediately forgets their argument and rushes to her side.

The next shot is always one of two situations. The first has the guy driving like crazy and weaving in and out of traffic as the girl moans in pain. If the audience isn't treated to some outrageous driving, they will always get to witness the woman being hastily wheeled down the hospital corridor on a stretcher by a group of nurses and doctors. Everyone is looking down at her as her husband tries to keep up and unsuccessfully tries to peek through the crowd at his girl.

From here, the audience is transported to the operating room where they have a view from the foot of the bed looking at the girl with her legs spread under a cover. The woman's hair is matted and plastered to her face with sweat as she screams. "Keep pushing/breathing," everyone in the room yells back. At this point the man shows up late with his scrubs and mask on. By the way, he was running down the corridor when she was on the stretcher, so why is he always late to the operating room? Once there, he will inevitably faint at the sight of his newborn crowning out of his wife. Hilarious, right? If he doesn't faint, he's by her side, petting her damp hair and occasionally leaning in for a sweaty smooch on the cheek. More yelling, more screaming, more obnoxious and unoriginal attempts at being funny until that wet and slimy life-form is sleeping contently in the arms of an exhausted and smiling mommy.

Whether the movie or television show is a comedy or a drama, for some reason the producers always feel that the birthing scene will add more hilarity or a new sense of comic relief. It's funny, right? A pretty girl throughout the show or movie is now an ugly, screeching beast. She wails expletives and curses her husband, but he better not think about leaving her side! The louder she howls, the funnier the scene, right? Or how about when she yells for drugs when just moments before she was insisting on having a natural birth? Man, that's classic!

I love a good romantic comedy. It's always fun watching a guy chase after a girl for an hour and a half and I've gotten a lot of advice from watching such movies. The birth scenes, however, are so cliche and overdone that they can almost ruin a movie for me.