Everyone has them. Those movies that you watch when you're alone. The ones you might not want to admit that you like or even own. Come on, admit it - everyone has a dirty little secret. I'm about to get real up in here. My guilty pleasures are the movies that I genuinely like and not even ironically. I watch them over and over alone in the dark with ice cream. (I miss having my old roommate Meg who would be so kind as to get drunk with me and break out these ridiculous movies all the while saying "you know you love it!") I say I hate romantic comedies... but sometimes... my vagina rears it's ugly...vagina.

1) Waiting to Exhale - It's not the story of friendship and shit. Fuck the sisterhood story. It's all about Angela Basset losing her mind over her man leaving her for a white bitch. First, I identify with that level of pain and heartbreak where you devote your entire self to someone and help them come up, only to have them shit all over you. So yes, setting fire to their status symbols does in fact seem like the appropriate response to that. Whitney Houston's fling with the growling weed man and Gregory Hines secret crush on the big girl Loretta Devine also makes for guilty love. Eventually I went so far as to BUY this movie! Now I just need a rainy day in and Hagan Daaz.

2) He's Just Not That Into You - UGH! This is so fucking embarrassing. I had no intention of ever watching what seemed to be another big budget bullshit movie cashing in on women's relationship sensitivity and exploiting it. I hate Sex and the City, so I never saw that episode that sparked the writing of the book. But sometimes, when I am home alone or am not feeling well, or bored terribly, or drunk I watch things I would never in my right mind view. This was case in point. Sure it was nice to see a gaggle of starlets being ridiculous (ScarJo I think you hear me.) But it was the sweet sincere Ginnifer Goodwin, whom I LOVE on Big Love, that lured me into this otherwise steaming pile. I know her pain of awkwardly trying to find someone to love and just doing one horrible thing after another and scaring men away. So, she got to me. And Jennifer Aniston's quest to get her long time boyfriend the Affleck to take the plunge with her. Then breaking up with him only to go through the biggest family crisis she's ever dealt with. I'm a sucker. I hate to admit it - but I have seen it 5 times this week alone.

3) How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days - For me this is even worse then owning up to than He's Just Not That Into You. Typical big budget romantic comedy premise. The idea is timeless. It's as if someone took an adorable vintage screwball comedy ala Barbara Stanwyck or Kathryn Hepburn and shit all over it.
But hear me out. It's on this list, so there is something there. I think I was sold by the love fern. It's the idea of a love fern. But we really we know this as the stand in child. I have seen this girl in my friends, or in my male friends doomed new girlfriends who are so caught up in trying to entrap this guy they are super hot for into being the one. Awkward hilarity ensues. So, yeah, I kind of enjoyed it. Matthew McConaughey is dumb as shit, but who cares as long as he's shirtless. Oh and same goes for Kate Hudson, as long as someone puts tape on her mouth and I get to call her Penny Lane...

4) Music & Lyrics - A bit of an obvious guilty pleasure. Anyone who knows me well can probably figure out the attraction for me. It's that brilliantly cliche mock 80's pop tune POP Goes My Heart! That song gets into my head on such a regular basis that I actually forget that it's not from a real band! I love the Wham! mock band. I love the aging Hugh Grant playing to house wives at Knotts Berry Farms. I like Drew Barrymore as the semi-neurotic but sweetly talented un-songwriter. This is also one of the few times where I still find Drew Barrymore's weird lispy lip thing cute and not a tragic sad gimic. I rooted for these characters to get together! OH and I have to say I love love love the ridiculous character of Cora! An amalgamation of Madonna going through her zen-tantric phase, Shakira (who is breathing down her neck!) and Britney pre-crazy but post slutty. Ugh, they had me at 80's.

5) Steel Magnolia's - Truly a movie I can only watch ALONE. Although there was this one time that my very tough hispanic lesbian friend Patti and I found ourselves glued to the set and crying watching this, when suddenly my boyfriend of the time comes home early and stops dead in his tracks. "What the hell is going on?" He looks scared. "What did you do to Patti!" He yells at me. Patti is embarrassed and trying to Kleenex her way back to normal. "It just gets to me yo!" she snibbles. "But Patti! Your my homeboy! Homeboys DON'T cry at this shit!" Well apparently homeboys DO cry at this shit, like bitches.
Hence why I have to be alone to watch it.
I have diabetes. So now this movie gets to me even more and on a bigger, harder level. The movie centers around Truvy's Beauty Parlor and Julia Roberts, who is a selfish southern girl, a diabetic, and a stubborn woman determined to get married and have a baby despite her condition. She does this and her family and friends laugh love and rejoice, until Julia over does it and is hospitalized, then dies. Her little baby toddler cutie pants son finds her collapsed and is home alone for hours screaming before anyone finds them and 911 is called.
The worst part of this is god damn Sally Field. GOD DAMN SALLY FIELD! I'm not made out of stone here people. When she has her breakdown in the funeral scene and screams at the top of her lungs 'I WANT TO KNOW WHHHHYYYY!!!" I snap and cry every fucking time. She's not phoning this one in, it's genuine heart felt rage. It's the pain of losing someone way too soon, and everyone in the scene as well as in the audience can feel it.
While Daryl Hannah can go fuck herself for even bothering to be in this movie of otherwise interesting characters, I find more redeeming qualities in the other plot lines and actresses. I love Dolly Parton no matter what the role is. I love Shirley MacLaine and Olympia Dukakis constantly sparring it out through the film, and the inside of joke of track lighting = GAY. Ugh, of all my guilty pleasures this is the one that is the worst and runs the deepest. If it's on and I'm alone, chances are I'm watching.