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I am sure this is going to get my arse kicked all around the place and am writing it with more trepidation than required. I am writing about the great genre of Chick Flicks. Note that I am not referring to it as RomCom as Romantic Comedies can go either way with the Hero or Heroine being the central character but the Genre of Chick flicks have a certain strain and flow that can only make it a chick flick

Well let me not reflect further and instead just provide you the recipe for a Chick Flick. Please note that although am a Male, I have lived with an Elder Sister for my entire life on this planet and also a wife for over 5 years now, so am somewhat of an outside expert on this topic much like the consultants on any project. Aware of it, know it but have not done it

Recipe for a Chick Flick

1. A warm, loving, fun-filled, gregarious girl who can say what she says well and is really sexy.
Note: There are no surly, nagging frustrated heroines of chick flicks thus making it amply clear for all the chicks who view these flicks to start assuming that there are no bad chicks ever in this world
2. Now the recipe can go 2 ways
2.1 Either the Girl is down on her luck now and really at the short end of the stick
OR
2.2 She is the lady on top of everything and has it all – the job, friends, the life and what not

3. To further the recipe, there is usual a motley of people. This motley is a mix of good and evil people.
3.1 If the Heroine is 2.1 then the gang is a mix of boys and not so pretty girls but who all have a wonderful “SOUL”. Yes Ladies & Gentlemen, we are now shown the soul of people and how wonderful their simple life is
3.2 If the Heroine is 2.2 then the gang is a mix of urbane sophisticated guys and gals who are all very droll and extremely wickedly funny and have this wonderful sense of humor

I digress at this point of reference to Humor in Chick Flicks. Be warned: I always assumed I had a great sense of humor and as all women in all flicks only wanted a guy with GSOH (That’s Good Sense of Humor you bloody chick flick Virgins), I thought all my bases were covered. NO WAY

Women in Chick Flicks and most probably (going on a limb here all around the world) want men who have a good sense of humor but look like Hugh Grant, Ralph Fiennes, Jude Law. So the humor is only an icing. So this got me to reality quite quickly & I know my humor is good but cannot get me girls

Well let’s get back to the recipe then

4. Please note in point 3, if heroine has 3,1 friends then the enemies and the VILLIANS of that movie will all be 3.2 type persons and vice-versa holds perfectly true also.
5. The case which can reject point 5 is when Heroine like 2.2 falls in love with a hero who is a 2.1 (Ex: Home Sweet Alabama etc….)
6. Now add to the recipe that creature called a Man/Hero of the Chick Flick. They are usually adornments of beauty who would mumble sweet nothings or simply mumble as being a man, he would have gone comatose in the sets of this flick after hearing all those really pithy and sugary dialogues
7. There can also be another Man (Guys, this is not that sort of a flick you watch alone at Night, this is a chick flick & hence another guy simply means another point of the triangle.) Even Point 7 Hero has a template. He can be warm, witty, gorgeous (yes I use words like gorgeous while writing. Put it down to watching too many chick flicks) and of course GAY. If he is not that, then he is that gruff, outdoorsman who has a heart of gold and the only one who understands the Heroine
8. Yes Guys and Guys…Please remember this really critical point. Women in Chick Flicks are very complex creatures but really are very simple. How you ask, well they only need LOVE (Yuck, Gross) and so are sadly never understood. Why can Man not have these issues? Well a Man Flick has too much action around a nuclear weapon with its designer gone AWOL, with a solider from mars on a rampage on earth and what not. So the human psyche sadly takes a back seat. But in a chick flick the Girl/Heroine and her mind is of primal importance. This is irrespective of whether she is 2.1 or 2.2 (Refer to points above)
9. Now to this already maddening recipe, add parents/older folks. They can either be absent minded dads who love their daughter, mothers who are wicked but turn for the better, all knowing Grand moms who are more psychic than the kid in Sixth Sense. They know everything there is to know about the girl. Usually seen in 2.1 Heroine movies. 2.2 Heroine movies have a father or a friend as in 7 above. The oldsters are usually shown either in the initial scenes of 2.2 plot line in big palatial places or in 2.1 small houses. They are all WARM…By this time the recipe has reached temperature levels of lava
10. Now to this recipe we will need to add the boss if it’s a working girl chick flick. They are of 2 kinds. If it’s a woman, then she is a BITCH and only does a turnaround in the end. Usually she is a 2.2 (refer above). If it’s a man, then he is of 2 kinds. If he is young, he can be the love interest or the friend who understands or the urbane villain who only wants to bed this innocent nubile nymph
11. There are these other characters also but they are minor ones like the Hairdresser, the Strong Gatekeeper or Concierge, the Café owner but thye do not add to the plot. If they add they will have to fall in the points above else there is possibility of a apocalyptic chick flick meltdown

Now I need to digress once again. You readers who have come till here on this post might want to know where the frigging Kahani is. Well fear not, there is NO KAHANI. All these characters are put together and a certain sequence of events follow and that forms the movie. This is THE SAME sequence for all the movies save for about 2-3% of them. Those 2-3% are hated by their viewers and never seen

Sequence of Events: (All points can be referred to from above)

1. Introduction of Heroine and her soul. If 2.1 then warmth and family is shown. If 2.2, gregariousness and friends, work is shown
2. Both 2.1 & 2.2 are extremely good and everything is great about them. 2.1 is just untapped or not seen potential. That’s the only difference
3. Introduction of friends and family. Demonstration of the great personality of the Heroine (What personality. The woman is blooming hot and sexy. She looks great as 2.1 or 2.2 and no one is looking for personality)
4. They have a boy friend who is noble (read boring and ready to be dumped) or have come out of a horrible break-up or have yet to meet their dream guy
5. If they have a boy friend then he turns shady and becomes untrustworthy. Entrance of the F&F (Friends & Family) who rally around, some comic sequence where the heroine either drinks or eats Hagen Daaz Ice cream and reflects upon her bad luck
6. If she has no boyfriend then this part is where everyone is setting her up with a loser and she is very sad but still has that Spunk to walk on
7. Point to note here is the launch of a nice pop song with a beat that shows her living her life to the fullest
8. As F&F are doing all they can do to 2.1, she chances upon a guy who has it all & the Hero wants 2.1 the way she is.

Point to Note here in all chick flicks is that a Heroine will never change and Hero loves her for what she is. Viewers of such crap tend to start thinking they can find this in their spouses and get a rude shock when they realize this is NEVER TRUE.

9. 2.2 Heroines slowly start to go down a spiral at this point of time. She loses her job or is about to lose her job due to the Bitch woman boss.
10. So 2.1 is slowly rising up and 2.2 is going down
11. They both meet Heroes who are opposite of them. Usually 2.2 is a strict woman who has lived within a box doing her work. Hero shows her the fun part and lots of pink at this time
12. With 2.1, it’s fairly cindrellaesque. The hero courting her is too good and is leading her on to be a 2.2/ Here in this case the BITCH is the mother of the Hero and not the boss
13. At this nice situation, a misunderstanding arises caused either by a F&F or by the heroine herself who is one total GIT anyway
14. F&F Rally around and the complication increases
15. Song montage with words like Survive, Live, Love, Trust and what not. Woman becoming stronger
16. At this time that complication gets resolved and 2.1/2.2 realizes the Hero was good and only the circumstance was bad. But by this time, the Hero is far away and not interested in her
17. Song Montage continues and here words are like Love, caring, sharing and the montage shots are warm soft focus shots of the man and heroine in total love. These are usually shots we have not seen or have seen and laughed. If we have seen them, consider them to be the best scenes as they are only shown in this montages usually
18. If it’s a 2.2 women, she will use sheer intellect find out that one missing thing her work needs and superseding her boss get it to the BITCH Boss’s Boss Nazar and et voila she has the BITCH Boss’s Job and is again on top
19. If it’s a 2.1 women she will show her simple but wonderful ways and teach that BITCH Mother-In-Law to be the reality of life & how great she 2.1 really is
20. Hero realizes all and wants to get back but heroine is nowhere in sight. She has as predicted in all movies left for yonder shores. This confrontation is usually between the Hero and a Friend of the Heroine. Friend does not tell anything and then hero gives his monologue about what he feels when he is with her yada yada yada..With the Heroine not the Friend you Chick Flick Virgins….
21. Friend softens, has a tear and tells all. At that point only Heroine is either in a Bus Stand, Train Station or Airport or some newer place of transportation. Chick Flicks getting made in 2100 or 2300 will still follow the same principle but the girl will be waiting at a space station to head to her planet
22. All head off to stop the girl and mad chase. Some benevolent people are also met on the way. Middle aged women, hard arsed cop who softens, et al and finally the guy goes and gets the Girl
23. All cheer and there are other proclamations of love between the F&F gangs of the Hero & Heroine. These are supposed to be jokes and the audience dumbasses that they are all laugh and enjoy it
24. Final scene is either a white wedding shot (They can be of any religion but in a chick flick all weddings are white and in church) or they are on a beach surrounded by F&F getting married or on their honeymoon in a sunny place
25. Slow warm song starts off and movie ends

This in a nutshell is the recipe for a chick flick. You can use this to make as many zillion movies you want and people will still go to see it and the audience is also of 2 types. The Women are all there because they wanted to see it and the Men are there because they were dragged there and threatened with bodily harm if they do not go to see the movie.

I know am going to get a lot of shit for this so guys rally around me and I will start singing that Survive, winner song with a montage of 100’s of women kicking the shit out of me

Cheers & Good Night
Deepak

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