Nir Shelter,

Thanks for your input. ?I have a different pov, frankly a love-hate relationship with the movie.

On the one hand, I hate the movie because it is a sexist portrayal that perpetuates the fantasy near and dear to men’s hearts (and other organs) of the whore with the heart of gold. ?I know better having worked for the LAPD.

?In Hollywood.

Periodically the department does vice sweeps, vacuuming up prostitutes and johns. ?In the summer time, as many as a 100 a night. ?And not one of the women was anywhere near as classy, good looking and socially adept and psychologically sensible as the Julia Roberts character. Not one of the 100’s that I saw.??Street prostitutes are wretched women, damaged goods, the dregs of the sex trade.

On the other hand, I love the movie because it’s a cleverly crafted story. Especially given the fact that the original script was a grim drama, not a romance, with a downer ending: the prostitute is an addict who doesn’t win the businessman’s heart, overdoses and dies at the end.

But when Buena Vista — aka: Disney — picked up the option, they waved their magic wand and turned the pumpkin into a beautiful carriage, rats?into horses ?– they transformed it into a Cinderella story.?

Anyway, this is my Exhibit “A” for a logline where it seems the relationship should get the spotlight, not whatever else either character is striving for. ?Where, in practical terms of promoting the script, ?the “B” story subs for the “A” story. ?The hook is ?their relationship, not their objective goals.

“A businessman falls in love with a prostitute whom he has hired for a week to be his escort” — that’s the elevator pitch.

Despite my “feminist fury” I know I’m howling in the wind. ?The fantasy of the prostitute with the heart of gold seems to be primal in the male psyche, perhaps archetypal. ?As long as it sells tickets, ?the fantasy will continue to be perpetuated in cinema.