---- SPOILER ALERT ----
The Painted Veil (2006)
The love affair between the leading wife and the Mr. Townsend was naturally something that got my interest. A typical bored married wife found her 'love' with another man Mr. Townsend, who was already married himself. When the doctor (the wife's husband) found out, he put her into a situation that either she walked out, divorced and shamed, or she followed him to their death into a cholera-ridden village in rural China.
You see the doctor was doing a very noble thing. He volunteered to cure a cholera outbreak in a remote village where it had claimed dozens if not hundreds of lives. He spent countless days and nights to figure out how to contain the outbreak while dealing with local superstitions, customs, and warlords. And, he was doing all these without any support from his own wife (until way later).
I'm going to spare the rest of the story as it's a typical 'woman learned her ways' type of development.
However, one quote from the wife that was quite memorable to me "Could a woman love a man for his virtue?", and I think we all know that the answer to that question is a No.
Next time you sit there and thinking if your noble cause and effort could win the heart of a woman or women, the answer is no. Don't get me wrong, you should still follow your heart if that's your calling, but don't expect women to swoon over you over that Noble Peace prize.
