Romeo and Juliet...
To me, the "intense love" between Marissa and Chris is as fabricated as the "intense love" in Romeo and Juliet. In Romeo and Juliet you have two people who meet for a dance or two and happen to fall in such deep love that they end their lives for one another. Call me a blasphomist but I just don't buy it. They were two hormonaly challanged teenagers who were infatuated with the idea of one another. At the start of the play the audience hears Romeo discuss his head over heels emotions for a woman (her name is escaping my memory) he just can't live without, this only lasts until he meets his next flavor of the week, Juliet. And Juliet is going through some normal 'i hate my family' teenage stuff and Romeo, the rebel, gives her a chance to escape from some of that. The reason that I bring all of this up is because Marissa and Chris have a very similar situation. They took a walk for about 15 minutes and then suddenly could not live without each other. Both sides of this are problematic. Chris exoticizes Marissa and really demeans her yet the movie portrays this as love. Although I do not think that finding a person's intelligence to be attractive as problematic, I do not think that Chris has and real idea of who she is or what she stands for. The closest to a deep conversation they have is Marissa telling him that he does not understand the real situation in the projects and that she does. He sees this attitude to be attractive and wants to have it in his life. Marissa on the other hand sees him as an opportunity to live this "dream" as her friend calls it. She also does not know Chris. As depicted by her friend, this relationship with Chris is a chance to live a life which is incredibly far removed from her current reality. As a single mother living in New York City, this would look awfully appealing. I think that people formulate emotions which are not really there and be blinded by attraction which is created by their own desires. So, at the end of the day, Marissa and Chris and just using each other to enhance areas in their life which they currently lack and the way that Hollywood portrays this to be a true love Cinderella story is problematic. Thanks for reading my rant :)