A Romanticization of the Romanticized and de-Romanticization of the un-Romanticized…Get It?

In more ways than one, American ideals have changed since the 1950’s. Instead of poodle skirts, girls are wearing booty shorts. Instead of boys asking girls if they want to go steady, boys are asking girls if they’d like to go back to their frat houses.

Moviegoers often see glimpses of the 1950’s (or the romanticized version that the movies sell) and these adaptations of history always show smiling faces, neighbors outside walking their dogs, fathers and sons playing catch on their perfectly manicured lawn, and the aroma of a summer barbecue wafting through the air. In a word: suburbia. Obviously, the suburbs still exist, and are still drawing people in for the comfort and the status of this lifestyle, but do the ideals associated with suburbia (or at the very least the ones portrayed in movies) still exist?

This evening, as often happens on a beautiful summer day, I went on a run around my DC-suburban neighborhood. It started off like any other: I passed a neighbor who I smiled and waved at and then I saw that one woman who always walks her dog around 8 o’clock. It wasn’t until the final stretch that I felt like I had stepped into a scene from Pleasantville. There it was: the green, freshly cut lawn with a father and son happily throwing a baseball and the savory smell of a nearby barbecue.

Truthfully, it could have been a scene from Pleasantville, or even something more Sci-Fi like a black hole that actually transported me to the 1950’s (and I believe that movie would be Back to the Future). It could have been if it weren’t for the fact that when I stepped inside my own suburban home I was greeted by the most recent episode of The Real Housewives of New York, with (unfortunately) the booty shorts and frat houses.

Do you love 1950’s Americana? Make sure to watch School for Charm and Bettie: the Girl in the Leopard Print Bikini.

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Emily Catino

SnagFilms Staff Blogger