Crazy tales of mental cross dressing

The movie “Think Like A Man” campares to “Taming of the Shrew” in many ways when it comes to deceit and the mindset of both genders. In TOTS there are two fair maidens. The youngest sister Bianca is a beautiful woman that all the men want. Her older sister Kate is beautiful also, but since she has a foul mouth and speaks her mind, no man wants her. While men begin to dress as other people to win Bianca, they can’t because her father will not let her marry till Kate is married. A man with his mind on his money makes a deal with the men and tries to win Kate over in a mental battlefield. He tries to make her think he loves her, then turns into a completely different man. In the movie “Think Like A Man” is a tale of 5 different stories with 5 different type of relationships. With 5 types of men and 5 types of women. All 10 battling it out in the battlefield and mental game of love, both use a book of knowledge written by Steve Harvey. The women use it to get inside the mens heads (without the men knowing) to get what they want. The men use the same book (the women don’t know) to make the women believe that they are falling right into their plan when in reality they’re just playing around to get what they want. Love is something shared between two people, but marriage and relationships are all about control.

"Quote from Play"

(Act 2, Scene 1,176-189)

Petruchio: “I will attend her here,

And woo her with some spirit when she comes.

Say that she rail; why then I'll tell her plain

She sings as sweetly as a nightingale:

Say that she frown, I'll say she looks as clear

As morning roses newly wash'd with dew:

Say she be mute and will not speak a word;

Then I'll commend her volubility,

And say she uttereth piercing eloquence:

If she do bid me pack, I'll give her thanks,

As though she bid me stay by her a week:

If she deny to wed, I'll crave the day

When I shall ask the banns and when be married.

But here she comes; and now, Petruchio, speak.”

This is Petruchio talking to himself about what he is going to say to Kate. He is giving himself a peptalk on how he is going to woo her under his control and make her think he loves her.

This is “The Dreamer”. He is going for “The woman who is her own man”. Being a “dreamer” he knows that he really doesn’t have enough money to meet her standards. So he uses the car to give her the idea that he is rich to catch her interest and then reel her in.  This connects to TOTS because one of the main characters, Lucentio, dresses up as a teacher to get close to Bianca. Since her father wants Kate to marry first, he is keeping all suitors away from Bianca except for her teachers.

(Act 4, Scene 3, 41-53)

Katherina. Young budding virgin, fair and fresh and sweet,

Whither away, or where is thy abode? 2305

Happy the parents of so fair a child;

Happier the man whom favourable stars

Allots thee for his lovely bed-fellow.

Petruchio. Why, how now, Kate, I hope thou art not mad!

This is a man, old, wrinkled, faded, withered, 2310

And not a maiden, as thou sayst he is.

Katherina. Pardon, old father, my mistaking eyes,

That have been so bedazzled with the sun

That everything I look on seemeth green;

Now I perceive thou art a reverend father.

Pardon, I pray thee, for my mad mistaking.

This shows kate losing the mental game that her and petruchio are both playing. She decides to submit to him.

In this picture, it displays the friends of the Dreamer and The Woman who is her own man. In the end of the movie, she realizes that love is not a game and she doesn’t want the money or fame. The dreamer ended up getting busted and the relationship was rocky. Even though he was not rich, he tried his best to make it seem like he had all the luxurious things. In the end, the “Woman who is her own man” came to him in the end and submitted saying that she doesn’t want all these luxurious things, she just wants him. She’s letting him be the man and be in control of their relationship. They just witnessed it and are surprised that she changed her mind.

Biondello: Why, Petruchio is coming- in a new hat and an old 1405

jerkin; a pair of old breeches thrice turn'd; a pair of boots

that have been candle-cases, one buckled, another lac'd; an old

rusty sword ta'en out of the town armoury, with a broken hilt,

and chapeless; with two broken points; his horse hipp'd, with an

old motley saddle and stirrups of no kindred; besides, possess'd 1410

with the glanders and like to mose in the chine, troubled with

the lampass, infected with the fashions, full of windgalls, sped

with spavins, rayed with the yellows, past cure of the fives,

stark spoil'd with the staggers, begnawn with the bots, sway'd in

the back and shoulder-shotten, near-legg'd before, and with a 1415

half-cheek'd bit, and a head-stall of sheep's leather which,

being restrained to keep him from stumbling, hath been often

burst, and now repaired with knots; one girth six times piec'd,

and a woman's crupper of velure, which hath two letters for her

name fairly set down in studs, and here and there piec'd with 1420

pack-thread.

In this picture, Megan Good plays a girl who always sleeps with the guys who don’t want to be in a commited relationship. In this picture she is buying a book. She uses it to think like a man. Making her boyfriend think that she isn’t aware of his games. But then he ends up using the book to trick her into making her think that he doesn’t know what she is doing as he follows along.

Both the book and the play show the mindsets of the natures of relationships that even relate to today. In the battlefield of love is a major struggle of power between the male and the female and the deceitful tactics are just used to get into each others heads. When it comes to love movies and stories, pay attention closely and there will always be a leading role whether it is male or female and there will always be a mental reign.

Citations:

Shakespeare, William, and Thomas Goddard Bergin. The Taming of the Shrew;. New Haven: Yale UP, 1954. Print.

Think like a Man. Sony, 2012. Website.