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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 12, 1981)
q! q' c=r § » £5 s^> 3 nostalgic Cards the most economical way to say 1 love you’ By Dana Smelser Battalion Reporter February 14, the day for lov ers. The cost of loving in a tradi tional style can be expensive. Fortunately, economical ways of saying "I love you" do exist. As with everything else, Valentine's Day will take a big ger bite out of many pocket- books this year. But with a little imagination, the pinch might not hurt so bad. On Valentine's Day the medium is not the message and gifts shouldn't steal the spot light. Therefore, gifts do not have to be practical or expen sive. The big seller for the holiday is your basic Valentine card. Greeting card manufacturers really clean up around this time, doing a business surpassed only by the Christmas rush. The average price of a Valen tine card is 75 cents. These range from the packets of 40 you bought when you were a kid, to the $7.50 deluxe models that cost almost that much in postage. As the economic forecast grows bleaker, surveys by a greeting card manufacturer show people are exchanging more Valentine cards than ever. United Press International re ports 800 million or so greeting cards will be exchanged in the United States on Feb. 14, most of them hand-delivered. If you want to reach out and toucn that loved one on Valen tine's Day, a ten-minute Happy Valentine's Day wish to Hous ton or Austin costs a little more than $3. Out-of-state rates are even lower. If the way to the heart is through the stomach, several local merchants can help out. Serendipity Shop in College Station offers personalized heart-shaped fudge. Swensen's Ice Cream Factory has intro duced a new cherry and mar shmallow filled flavor, called simply "Love." If a man plans to wine and dine his sweetheart in style, he should expect to pay about $30. Prices range from $6.75 for cat fish at TJ's Restaurant to $12.85 for lobster at Fish Richard's Half Century House. According to Glamour Maga zine, a one ounce bottle of Chanel No. 5 perfume which sold at $40 in the mid-70s is now selling for $75. A dozen roses, 25 years ago cost $5, Glamour said. A dozen long-stemmed roses are now selling for $35 to $40 at local flor ist shops. Louie Walston, owner of Nan's Bossom Shop, said the prices always go up around Valentine's Day because rose growers try to make the best profit they can. A shortage of roses exists in Februaiy because of the high demands, he added. Spring arrangements may be a more economical choice. A bunch starts at $12.50. Bud vases are sold from $5 to $7.50. Valentine's Day is the time to let your true feelings by known. A poster with "We love each other for what we are," seems to make perfect sense on February 14. facts and satisfies even the sweetest of sweet tooths, it supplies a source of quick energy due to the small amounts of caffeine and theobromine which have stimulat- in handy if Those chocolates Valentine swei Researchers at New Yo. tute studied people who had i affairs and discovered that after the i VT _ are in Jove, the chemical that is also te. a Maya Indian That's not a particularly appetizing word ori- gin, but considering the calorie content of a choco late cream (one average candy is about 75 calories) I maybe the name shouldn't be tempting. I W Love MOVIES By Kate McElroy Battalion Staff Hollywood doesn't wait for Valentine's Day to create love movies. But on that day of hearts and flowers, everyone's thoughts turn to romance and the like. Even though they're abun dant, movies about love aren't all alike. So Focus wanted a con cise, but academic essay on love as depicted in the cinema. But rather than give one person's warped and undeniably shallow view of romance movies (which included an expose on the film ing of "Debbie Does Dallas"), here instead is a short guide to types of romance movies: The tragic love: The actual pairing, rather than the action, causes tragedy, and men usual ly get the worst of the deal. In "Lolita," middle-aged Humbert Humbert met his downfall when he started hanging out and traveling about with the nymphet. Another ill-fated ro mance exists in "The Blue Angel," in which a teacher loses self-respect for Marlene Diet- rich, a Berlin nightclub singer. Of course, the classic mismatch ed pair has got to be King Kong and Fay Wray — she made a monkey out of him. The ironic tragic love: In the course of the movie, something hapipens that makes the ro mance tragic. In "West Side Story," the tragedy is that Maria (Juliet) loves Tony (Romeo) even though the two are connected with rival gangs. Any dramati zation of an Ernest Hemingway work is depressing, especially "For Whom the Bell Tolls," in which Gary Cooper and a teary Ingrid Bergman separate. Of course, Bergman's finest teary ending occurs in "Casab lanca," when she has to leave Humphrey Bogart. "Casablan ca" is a great love story, has an intriguing plot and excellent casting. The diseased love: Many good love affairs ended because someone, in this case usually the woman, got sick. These films are all tear-jerkers, the best of all being "Love Story." Ryan O'Neal and Ali McGraw made such a lovely couple, but an "un identified blood disease" ruined the perfect marriage. The epic love: In these, ro mances are as monumental as the films themselves. The epi tome is "Gone With the Wind." Scarlett and Rhett are so famous even College Station streets are named after them. Any version of "Cleopatra" also fits in this category, including the 1963 box-office bomb, in which Dick and Liz started their own epic romance. The "different" love: Odd couples and bedfellows are lov ers in some films. In 1967, Sid ney Poitier and Katherine Houghton were an extremely radical couple in "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner." But by 1979, audiences freely accepted a voluptuous pig pursuing an intellectual frog and a Holly wood career in "The Muppet Movie." The musical love: Some peo ple cry or laugh their way into your hearts; others sing. Here's the set pattern in musicals: boy hates girl and vice-versa, then they fall in love, and at the end live happily ever after. Especial ly noteworthy are Gene Kelly and Debbie Reynolds in "Sing- in' in the Rain." In any Fred Astaire or Bing Crosby movie, the stars were crooning for women. And the women always crooned back. In "The Sound of Music," Julie Andrews sang ab out her favorite things — one of which turned out to be Christ opher Plummer. The funny love: Every now and then, someone realizes love is a big joke. Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy in "Pat and Mike," and "Adam's Rib" proved love could be a laughing matter. Woody Allen's "Annie Hall" and "Manhattan" show modem love is still a laughing matter—only now iTs neurotic. And in Neil Simon's "Goodbye Girl" and "Chapter Two," love is not only funny and neurotic, but also so syrupy it causes cavi ties. But love movies are supposed to be sweet. Anyway, they're cheaper than chocolate — but not by much.