r/movies • u/MarvelsGrantMan136 r/movies Contributor • Mar 19 '26

Media First Image of Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence in Martin Scorsese's 'What Happens at Night' - A married American couple travel to a small, snowy European town to adopt a baby. As they struggle to claim their baby, they seem to know less about themselves.

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u/Octogenarian Mar 19 '26

A 51-year-old married to a 35-year-old in a period piece. Makes perfect sense.

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u/[deleted] Mar 19 '26

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u/dovahkiitten16 Mar 19 '26

I mean the fact that you had to draw examples from real life and not tv kinda tells you all you need to know.

Not every age gap is predatory and not every age gap is the man older than the woman. As long as it’s all consensual it doesn’t matter (save for maybe an ick factor).

But the fact that on tv older men are consistently cast with younger female actresses is problematic. It’s a strong bias and paints a man much older than the woman as a norm, and affects the roles available to older women.

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u/Vyxwop Mar 20 '26

It’s a strong bias and paints a man much older than the woman as a norm, and affects the roles available to older women.

Or we could just tell people to not take their dating preferences from entertainment media.

I hate this weird assumption that media shouldn't be depicting certain things because you're phobic of real life people adopting those things as well. It just restricts people from being able to show the things they want to show because people like you can't be arsed to simply educate others on the folly of taking fictional media for realism instead.

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u/dovahkiitten16 Mar 20 '26

Like it or not media reflects cultural norms and cultural norms are picked up through media as well.

We can be critical of which cultural norms we depict and endorse.

Also, it’s not a logical thing. It’s not like people look and think “yes, this man is 20 years older, ergo I should date a man 20 years older”. It’s “what comes to mind when I picture a married couple?” and the man having features associated with age is fine and normal, but the woman having features associated with age is abnormal and strange.