Is He Too Old For Me –The Manhattan Get Scale Inequity

Is He Too Old For Me –The Manhattan Get Scale Inequity

I get this question a lot, and obviously there is no one right answer. Charlie Chaplin was 54 when he married 18 year old Oona, and they lived happily to his death; Lauren Bacall was 20 when she married the 45 year old Humphrey Bogart.

But what happens most often is that the younger woman is always the more mature one and that as the relationship progresses, that fact becomes more and more obvious.

If you take a step back, this makes sense – why isn’t that 27 year old guy dating women his own age? Why is he even considering that 16 year old, that 18 year old? Why would a 15 year old choose a 5 year old as a best friend rather than someone of a similar age? It's not that the 5 year old is so mature, it's that the 15 year old is creepy.

Okay, if you’re considering giving up your youth to an older guy, you owe it to yourself to spend at least 20 minutes watching these clips from the movie Manhattan – here is Woody Allen and his 17 year old girl friend – Mariel Hemingway shows up a couple minutes in, but it’s fun to watch Meryl Streep in a very early performance first:

And what happens to young girls in this situation is usually that the relationship flip-flops, and the fact that the girl is and has always been the more mature one becomes obvious to everyone, even her – which you can see in the closing scene from Manhattan.

See how she is far more mature, even at 18? See how he doesn’t want her to learn more about the world, because he knows she will completely eclipse him if she does?

Did you watch carefully? Did you have the impulse to step into the screen, bodily grab Mariel’s arm and drag her away from that creepy older guy? In all likelihood, this may well be what your friends and even parents are seeing when they see you and your older boyfriend.

But maybe that situation is too close to make the point – watch here as an older woman works to seduce a younger man:

Now do you see the creepy? There is astonishing creepy potential in the situation!

Just some things to think about.

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