Bride-to-be Blogger Stephanie: My Favorite Wedding Movie


Bride-to-be Blogger Stephanie: My Favorite Wedding Movie

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The stars aligned over the weekend in the form of one of my favorite movies ever on TBS.

Pat and I were spending a rare, relaxing Sunday in. “Stephanie, guess what’s on!” Pat said with a grin, knowing the overwhelming excitement I was about to burst into.

I didn’t even have to look up. I recognized the scene immediately. Adorably irritated George Banks. Irresistibly eccentric Franck.

It was Father of the Bride, a movie I’ve adored since the very first time I saw it. When my sister and I were sick and stayed home from school as kids, Father of the Bride was our irrefutable movie of choice. I know it by heart, can recite every line.

When I said it’s hard to pinpoint exactly when I first started dreaming about shopping for my wedding dress, I very well may have had my first dress dream when I first saw this movie.

I’ve read several reviews that describe Writer/Director Nancy Meyers movies (Father of the Bride, It’s Complicated, Something’s Gotta Give, The Holiday) as “women’s porn.” I think it’s a very accurate statement: attractive people with glamorous, enviable jobs living in outrageously stunning homes in a gorgeous setting, surrounded by loving people.

Meyers’ Father of the Brid” made weddings and the planning process dream-worthy: an ultra-fun, quirky wedding planner, mother-daughter planning bonding, a delightful fiancé, a protective father, an at-home wedding at a house out of a fantasy on the most picturesque suburban street, a magnificent reception tent in the backyard lit with Christmas lights and candles.

And while I love reveling in this unrealistic perfection, beyond all the gorgeous aesthetics, it’s really about a father and daughter’s relationship, and it’s the moments always accompanied by the enchanting melody (if you’ve seen the movie, I’m sure you can recall the tune that finds its way into all the important, emotional scenes) that make this movie one of my favorites of all time and that instantly incite tears. Moment examples below (I’m tearing up just typing):

  • Mom Nina walking down the stairs on the wedding day with husband George looking at her in that heart-stopping, I-love-you-so-much-after-all-these-years way.
  • Father George and daughter Annie playing basketball the night before the wedding when it begins to snow. Annie worries he’s upset the snow is going to cost more money, but he says, “I know I’ll remember this moment for the rest of my life.”
  • When the priest asks, “Who presents this woman?” and George goes into an internal monologue where he reflects on how “I realized at that moment that I was never going to come home again and see Annie at the top of the stairs. Never going to see her again at our breakfast table in her nightgown and socks.”
  • When George is devastated that he didn’t get to see Annie before she left for her honeymoon and the phone rings. He tells Nina, “That was Annie,” in a way that makes your heart literally melt.

I love, love, love this movie. I wish I had a better reason for writing this blog, tying it into my own wedding planning narrative or some kind of lesson I learned from the film. Maybe it’s best to explain this as my ode to my favorite wedding movie of all time, a movie that makes me cry and smile and laugh every time I watch it. And let’s add: a movie that makes me appreciate how lucky I am to be getting married and has me aspiring to a wedding with some semblance of the warmth, charm, and magical-quality of this one.

What’s your favorite wedding movie? Is there anything about it that you try to apply to your own planning or Big Day?

 

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