(World) War (II) and Sex

I saw this movie called, “The Land Girls.” What a delightful movie this is. Well, it has the shitiest ending in the universe, but we’ll ignore that. I wonder why I’ve never heard of it. It’s just appeared in the video stores here in Bangkok and I got a cheap VCD of it. It’s the story about three women who were “Land Girls” during WWII in the countryside in England. Because men were off fighting the wars, the women were sent off to the countryside to make food (much like the American women in the factories). It’s really fascinating because (I think) it’s a good portrayal of the behavior of people during WWII, even if they’re removed from the actual battlefields, out in the beautiful and serene rural areas. Still, people act a certain way in a war, and hell if I don’t like the rampant sex and desperate love affairs that it creates. And fuck off to anyone who judges. People do what they want, they don’t worry about social mores. And all those Dear John letters. Oh man.

The movie is a drama, but it has its wonderful comical quirks. This fascinating concept that we could die at any second, so let’s fuck, let’s fall in love, let’s get married! It’s wonderful in a way – it’s living life to its fullest, not taking anything for granted, in its most extreme sense. I try very hard not to take things for granted, like my time here in Bangkok, but I am human, it is impossible not to do it somewhat.

It has this endless sexual theme throughout and how each girl approaches it. The girls are all young and attractive – two of them are actually some of my favorite actresses – and there’s one son, of the farmer, on the farm with them. You can imagine what happens afterward. And of course, of the three, there’s always the cheeky slut. But she’s actually the least interesting character. And I really like how they have the “good” girl and the “proper” girl and they’re quite different from each other. They don’t make them total archetypes or caricatures.

I wonder what it is about WWII. Why do “we” find it so romantic, so enchanting, so endlessly fascinating? Vietnam was too shameful, Korea too short and obscure, World War I too far away. The stories out of WWII though seem inexhaustible. And I admit to being drawn to it myself. I wrote my major Scandinavian project paper on WWII in Denmark and did my Master’s thesis on WWII in the Philippines. I have often wondered who I would have been during WWII (I always see myself in Europe). I often see myself as either a saboteur or a Mata Hari type. Or of course, the person hiding a family of Jews in my basement. But I suppose we all imagine ourselves like this. Like the joke how every woman imagines herself as Joan of Arc or Cleopatra in a past life, and every man thinks he was…I don’t know, Alexander the Great? Napolean? What do men fantasize about? Or do they only fantasize about sex? Anyway. No one ever envisions his or herself to be a leper, or poor peasant, or beggar.