Secretary: My happy place

Although I'm mostly blogging about erotic novels that have influenced me, writing in my last post about the movie Exit to Eden got me thinking about Secretary, a truly great romantic comedy that also happens to be about a BDSM relationship.*  Starring Maggie Gyllenhaal and James Spader -- and really, do I need to say more?  Is there any actor in the world more skilled than Spader at taking a vile character and making him utterly appealing?  Boston Legal, anyone?  I think I'll just drift off into happy fantasies now.

Oh, er, yeah, hi.  I'm back. 

Secretary has the most important element of a romance: two characters who make each other better at the deepest level.  Not by switching to contact lenses or to a career selling cupcakes, but by helping each other face the truths about themselves that they could not face alone, and embracing those truths. 

If you haven't seen it, make time for it. 

*  Yes, I'm using BDSM in the more general sense of a relationship that includes dominance and submission and lots and lots of spanking, not in the technical sense of a relationship that includes dominance and submission and spanking and safe words and constant checking in about consent.