Chapter 18

Soul Mates

Many of us believe in soul mates. Even more would love to believe in them. Two people who are fated to be together. Whose destiny is each other. Even more of us want to believe. The difficulty in writing this type of love story is that it requires that part of the story occurs outside of this world and these lives. In order to be destined, that destiny has to be designed or created somewhere outside of earth time and space. In heaven? In a previous life? This sort of thing. If you aspire to write one of these, it is workable, but you have to create the rules and then play by them, the way fantasy and sci-fi genre writers do.

Made in Heaven (1987, written by Bruce A. Evans and Raynold Gideon) is one of those that literally sets up the love story before birth. A young man, Mike (Timothy Hutton), dies too soon, heroically trying to save kids from drowning when their car goes into the river. In heaven he meets his soul mate, Annie, played by Kelly McGillis, and they make a plan to meet in their next life on earth. She is whisked away to be born. He rushes after and then slowly begins to forget the plan. If he doesn’t find her by the age of 30, he won’t know her. The clock is ticking. All of these rules were obviously made up by the writer. See how they work?

He sees signs sent to keep him on track and remind him of his mission.

My favorite scene in this movie is when Mike is hitchhiking and is given a ride by the elderly couple who were actually his parents in his last life (Ann Wedgworth and James Gammon). They don’t recognize each other, but something about this boy puts them in mind of their own that was drowned. And they are kind to this one, motherly and fatherly toward him at a moment when he badly needs the kindness of a mother and father. It was a touching scene.

Most of this movie works fairly well, even with Debra Winger playing Emmett Humbird, a devilish sort of male angel sent to nudge Mike onto the right track.

My only problem with this movie is that when the soul mates do finally meet each other on earth, in the eleventh hour, fifty-ninth minute, with one second remaining on the clock, they are on the street in Manhattan at rush hour and they walk right into each other’s arms and embrace. This isn’t right. People don’t actually do this. In the real world. Or the movie world. They can recognize each other. Soul recognition. But to embrace before “hello”? Maybe in 1967 at Woodstock or a love-in. But today in the city? No. This could so easily have been fixed. We waited, believing, through 120 minutes of screen time. Don’t make us stop believing at the last minute.

Another reincarnation romcom that is a lot of fun is Chances Are (1989, written by Perry and Randy Howze). Robert Downey, Jr. plays Louie, a young newlywed with a pregnant wife he adores. He is abruptly killed by a speeding car. He gets to heaven and is so anxious to get back to his wife and baby that he misses getting the shot that makes us forget our last lifetime so we can start afresh.

Twenty years later, Louie, now named Alex, is at college, meets a girl at the library, Miranda (Mary Stuart Masterson) and they are drawn to each other. But when she brings him home for dinner, he recognizes her mother as his beloved wife Corinne (Cybill Shepherd) and suddenly he remembers everything. Where the spoons are kept. Everything. He is frantic to convince Corinne that he is Louie but she of course thinks he’s crazy and a stalker both. How could he know all these things? Eventually, he knows so many details that only Louie could know, that Corinne believes him. And they find the love that they had lost so violently and suddenly. But it is not his destiny this lifetime.

He is meant to be with his daughter from his last life. Corinne is meant to be with Louie’s best friend (Ryan O’Neal). Alex is meant to forget that he ever was Louie. With a lot of fun machinations this is all eventually accomplished.

Heaven Can Wait (1978, written by Elaine May and Warren Beatty) has Beatty’s Joe Pendleton taken out of his body by an angel right before he and his bicycle looked like they were going to be smashed to bits. But it was a mistake. The truck in the tunnel would have missed him. Not only that, but Joe was about to play in the Super Bowl as quarterback. Bummer. So Heaven owes Joe a body, and it has to be one that can play in the Super Bowl, like soooon. He looks at a few guys on the verge of being killed, but none of them is right. Then he finds one that he might be able to get into shape. And it happens to be a billionaire. Who can afford to buy the L.A. Rams and make himself the quarterback. Are we having fun yet? You bet.

The story may be silly, but comedies work fine with silliness as long as it is genuinely funny and this one is. The love story comes in the lovely form of Betty Logan (Julie Christie), a political activist who comes to this rich Leo Farnsworth to protest wrongs his corporation is doing. He falls for her immediately, and she is stunned at how readily he comes around to her side and promises changes and then makes them.

The problem is that this body is only temporary. And when he gets his final body to inhabit, he won’t remember anything. Not Joe Pendleton or Leo Farnsworth or most importantly, the lovely Betty Logan. He has only a few short minutes to try to set up his future happiness. He tells Betty that if someday she meets a guy and something about him feels familiar, he might even be a quarterback, she should have a cup of coffee with him. She doesn’t understand. Then Leo is killed (again) and Joe is thrust into the body of a football player who is killed in the middle of the Super Bowl. And after the game when Joe and Betty meet, they don’t recognize each other. They are strangers.

The man she loved has just died. She’s looking for his friend, the Rams coach, which is why she’s at the stadium. She asks Joe for directions to the locker room. He tells her. Then he hesitates. There’s something about her. They are alone, the last two in the corridors after the cheering has died.

When they come out onto the field she is staring at him differently. In the dark, his voice was familiar. He’s supposed to go to a party, but suddenly he doesn’t feel like going to a big party. Would she like to get a cup of coffee maybe?

This one was the third remake of a beloved old romcom. Like the old saying goes, the third time’s a charm.

We have all seen those movie scenes where two people lock eyes across a crowded room. Or on a subway platform. Or in a bar. Recognizing each other and falling in love at first sight? Soul mate recognition? Writers should never depend on actors to sell a story point. We try to give actors fully created characters and stories for them to enact. We don’t hope that their talent will save us embarrassment because we don’t have the skills we need. No. You set it up. Then you get to pay it off. Why do they recognize each other? What do they see in each other? Actors do a lot of things, but they are not paid to fill in your blanks.

If you want to write a soul-mate story, just remember that you have to set up their destinies, make the rules, then play it out, following them. When two souls are each longing for their “other” you can get a lot of emotional payoff when they finally find The One.