Movie Analysis: When Harry Met Sally

I am neither a “rom-com” nor a “chick-flick” kind of girl, but When Harry Met Sally is one of my all-time favorite movies because of its humorous analysis of dating, relationships, and friendships between the opposite sexes. It all begins when college graduates Sally Albright and Harry Burns drive from Chicago to New York City together to begin the next chapter of their lives. They argue about and discuss relationships and sex, leading the film’s famous theme to be brought up: “Can men and women be just friends?” Over the next 12 years of their lives, Harry and Sally randomly meet a few more times, and with Harry’s persistence and against his own philosophy, they eventually become very good friends. Sally and Harry seem inseparable—attending museums, going to dinner, talking every night on the telephone—and yet they are dating other people and denying that there is anything but friendship between them. Eventually, after a difficult breakup for Sally, she calls Harry over to comfort her, and they end up having sex and ruining their friendship. They are no longer friends for a time and have a few confrontations, but after some reflection on both characters’ sides, they realize they are in love and they end up together (finally). It’s an interesting movie in that it suggests a more realistic representation of relationships than do most romantic comedies (in my opinion, anyway) and actually suggests that sex can get in the way of friendships and can indeed have negative consequences. Harry and Sally have an emotionally intimate friendship but they are also, after a time, completely comfortable around each other to the point where they can talk about sex quite frankly without embarrassment. Although they aren’t technically “in love” until the end of the movie, I’m going to argue for this assignment that their relationship in the movie is actually a romantic one since they are so emotionally invested in one another and spend so much time together.

            Scene 1: On their road-trip to New York City, Harry and Sally make a pit-stop at a diner for supper. After they finish eating, Harry is sitting quietly staring at Sally and tells her that she is attractive. She is angry because she assumes it is a “come-on”—which Harry does not deny—and he is currently dating one of Sally’s good friends. Harry jokes around with her, rhetorically asking her why a man can’t say a woman is attractive without it being a “come-on.” Sally firmly tells him that they will just be friends, which is when Harry brings up the infamous point that men and women can’t be friends because the sex part always gets in the way. The clip can be watched here: http://youtu.be/aJz1f8hPRGc

            As far as communicating what men are supposed to act like in a relationship, Harry kind of exemplifies this when he tells Sally she’s attractive—and then (jokingly) suggests they spend the night in a motel. This reflects Kim et al’s research of heterosexual scripts that men will act on their sexual needs (2007, p. 146) and Ward’s assertion that “men are characterized as being in a constant state of sexual desire and readiness”(2003, p. 356). Sally retorts to Harry’s assertion that men can’t be friends with women they find attractive by asking if men can be friends with women they find unattractive, to which Harry replies “No, they’d pretty much want to nail them too.” This also follows Ward’s observation that men are depicted as constantly sexually ready (2003, p. 356).

            This scene doesn’t really give a good picture of what women are supposed to act like or want in a relationship, although it could be argued that Sally’s offense at Harry’s “come-on” is the “women […] set sexual limits” dimension of Kim et al’s concept of the female heterosexual script (2007, p. 147).

            Scene 2: After their friendship has grown more established and they have become older, Harry and Sally are sitting in Katz’s Delicatessen having lunch, talking about Harry’s promiscuous habits and how he never wants to sleep over at a woman’s house. Sally gets upset because Harry is acting very nonchalantly and is full of confidence that he is awesome at sex. She asks him how he knows the women he sleeps with enjoy themselves and he assures her that he knows they orgasm. Sally doesn’t believe him and tells him that most women have faked it at one time or another and, when Harry doesn’t believe her, she fake orgasms loudly in the middle of the restaurant, smiles at him, and calmly goes back to eating her sandwich. http://youtu.be/F-bsf2x-aeE

            This scene contains several messages for both men and women concerning their supposed roles in sexual, romantic relationships. First, Harry acts nonchalantly when Sally asks him about they way in which he treats the one-night-stands he sleeps with and sarcastically tells her he feels terrible about making up a lie in order to leave after sex. This follows the male heterosexual script traits of “treating women as sexual objects” and “avoiding commitment and emotional attachment with women” (Kim et al, 2003, p. 147). He then goes on to defend himself by telling Sally that the women he sleeps with have orgasms, and denies that they could be faking it, going along with the “scripted notion that sexual prowess is an important component of boy’s/men’s masculinity” (Kim et al, 2003, p. 147). Sally further asserts this code when she says, “Oh, I forgot—you’re a man. […] All men are sure that it never happens to them.”

            Sally, on the other hand, is fulfilling the heterosexual code of “seeking stability and emotional involvement from male partners” by essentially telling Harry that she is angry with him on behalf of all women when he lies to get out of emotional attachment (Kim et al, 2003, p. 147). Sally’s statement that all women have, at one time, faked an orgasm follows the heterosexual script in that it shows how women “do not expect, demand, or prioritize their own sexual pleasure” (Kim et al, 2003, p. 148). It could be argued that her display of a fake orgasm is part of Kim et al’s Female Courting Strategy since she does it to prove a point to Harry, or to “attain power in [the] romantic relationship” and it could be considered “playful innuendo” (2003, p. 148).

            Scene 3: After Harry runs into his ex-wife with her new husband, he explodes in anger at his two friends in the process of moving in together, telling them that they will eventually divorce and everyone will end up miserable. Sally goes outside after him and reprimands him, culminating in an argument between the two. Begin this clip at 1:31 to see the short scene: http://youtu.be/gtWg8_2nNXs

            The argument begins with Sally gently reprimanding Harry for blowing up, and he responds by turning the focus back on her and how “nothing upsets her,” referring to her big breakup with Joe—this could arguably be coded as female passivity, under Kim et al’s Feminine Courtship Strategies (2003, p. 148). Harry asks her if she’s so over Joe, then why isn’t she sleeping with anybody? This exemplifies Harry’s understanding of relationships in terms of the male heterosexual script trait, “actively pursuing sexual relationships” (Kim et al, 2003, p. 147), though for him it’s a way of coping with feelings of loss. Sally becomes very angry and tells him that sleeping with someone has nothing to do with getting over Joe and tells Harry that she will sleep with someone when it is “making love” and not the way he does it. By saying this Sally follows the heterosexual coding of the “Good Girl,” setting sexual limits, and generally seeking an emotional attachment to sexual partners as well as not prioritizing sexual desire (Kim et al, 2003, p. 147-148). Finally, this scene encompasses two different types of sexual relationships as discussed by Ward; recreational, which in Harry’s style is that “the purpose of sex is to enjoy oneself,” and relational, which Sally defends as a way to “maintain a relationship” and “sex as a way by which to express affection and intimacy” (1995, p. 600).

Based on traits of both female and male heterosexual scripts as well as definitions and characteristics of recreational sexual relations versus relational sexual situations, it seems that When Harry Met Sally is suggesting that recreational sex is more likely to be a “man’s domain” and relational sex is more likely to be a “woman’s domain.” I don’t think that it would be unfair to say that this observation is reflected in several other contemporary films and television shows, although this film raises interesting questions about the boundaries of male/female friendship that many other media do not address.