Why doesn’t the backpacker “learn to settle down”?

There’s obviously a conflict of lifestyles and temperaments here — they are intrinsically an odd couple. Which has potential for drama in “reel” life, if not much for a long lasting relationship in real life.

But, alas, the logline seems biased in favor of the backpacker. In fact, the logline seems to give away the ending: the story is not about whether he’s going to leave, but when. “He must learn to leave his home behind.” So where is the suspense?

I suggest there would be more dramatic tension and emotional honesty if both characters have equally compelling and cogent arguments for their lifestyles. (After all, somebody has to stay home and rear and shear the sheep. Otherwise the backpackers will have to pursue their vagabond lifestyle buck naked.)

It seems to me that in the best and most believable relationship dramas it’s a fair and balanced fight: both sides have equally valid reasons for their positions and choices. Both are equally right. And both are equally wrong.

In real life and reel life, does it make emotional sense that having one party doing the capitulating is sufficient for “true love to flourish”? (What reciprocal sacrifices, what compromises is the backpacker making?) Or does “true love” flourish when couples find common ground, mutual understanding and acceptance, make reciprocal compromises, tradeoffs?

If the sheep shearer is going to run away with the backpacker, then it seems to me it ought to be planted even before he meets her that he’s a misfit in his current life, discontented with shearing sheep. That’s the cause; her coming into his life is the catalyst for him to do something about it.

But then, why not go against the Hollyweird stereotype which almost always favors the foot-loose and free-spirited? Why not a story about a vagabond whose subjective need is to learn how to settle down “for true love to flourish”?

fwiw