Engaged: Five films that defined my relationship with my fiancée

The proposal

If the social media barrage hasn't already informed you, I got engaged this past weekend to attorney-at-law and the unofficial editor of this movie blog, Elizabeth Rosado.

Movie-watching has been a huge part of our relationship, and thank God, she is a film buff just like I am. I thought as an homage to this huge life step I would take a look back at the five films that, for me, sort of defined us as a couple -- at least so far.

These aren't necessarily her favorite movies or mine, although some do make both of our lists.

It's more about the context in which we watched them, although the content being awesome matters a great deal as well.

For instance, there's Coming to America. Now, this is one of my favorite comedies of all time. And on one of the first of many unofficial dates, we decided to watch this Eddie Murphy classic on Instant Netflix on a whim. This was incredibly impressive to me on a great many number of levels.

First off, it was nearly 3 a.m. when we decided to embark on this journey to Zmunda and beyond -- so I'm thinking to myself, this girl's a badass. Second, I knew that if she appreciated this film as much as I did we were definitely going to connect on a cosmic level. Not only did we complete the film but we found ourselves relishing our favorite one liners at the same time.

On what I believe was our third "official" date we attending a Rocky Horror-style midnight screening of one of the greatest bad movies ever made -- Tommy Wiseau's epic The Room. Now, I can't express enough our mutual obsession with this film, we reference and imitate it constantly and are pretty cultish about getting our friends to see it and become part of the fun.

This midnight showing was a raucous good time, people dressed up (we didn't, we weren't 'there' yet), spoons and footballs were thrown (if you've seen the film you'd understand), and watching this bizarre monstrosity with an audience really enhanced the experience. Little did I know that midnight movie watching was going to become a staple of our two-plus years and counting together.

The Nitehawk Cinema in Williamsburg has long been one of our favorite spots. They play a great selection of films, especially late at night and sometimes early in the day for brunch. We've had so many interesting visits there, some terrific (Three Amigos, with an all-female mariachi band), some disappointing (drunken hecklers ruined one of my all-time favorites, Repo Man, for Liz) -- but always memorable.

It's hard for me to think of a favorite screening but I do remember being so excited and relieved that Liz appreciated the charms of Caddyshack, one of my favorite movies and comedies of all time. The movie is unapologetically crude and sophomoric, and some could, in a derogatory way, call it a "boy's movie" but Liz totally got it, and while I don't believe one should place too much stock in "liking the same things" when it comes to a relationship, this is one instance where I'll make an exception.

Which leads me to my next pick: Rocky. I'm not exactly sure why, but for some reason this sentimental, but still moving, Oscar winner just sort of became "our movie." Obviously the romance between Rocky Balboa and the mousy Adrian is sweet -- but there is also just a lot of genuine heart and determination in this movie. I think it speaks to Liz and I because deep down we're both very emotional people who resent unbridled cynicism.

This movie dares to be corny in the best way and it kicked off our habit of marathon watching movie series. For the record Liz actually liked Rocky II better than any of the others. Hey, no one will ever accuse her of not having a singular sensibility.

Scarlett Johansson in Under the Skin

And that leads me to my fifth selection, Under the Skin. Liz and I saw this kind of on the fly. We heard it was supposed to be weird and interesting -- and it was. We saw it in a Times Square theater with a sparse audience we suspect were seeing this sci-fi mind-bender because they heard Scarlett Johansson gets naked in it. She does, but the film is far more interesting than that.

Still, we noticed people walking out and seemingly turned off by the film. I had no idea how Liz would react, I was enthralled. When it was over we both immediately started gushing about how fantastic it was. And Liz being Liz, she found all sorts of feminist messages within the narrative that I had never even thought of. Watching movies with her is often an intellectual experience as well as an act of escapism, and I appreciate that so much.

The best part of all this is I get to keep experiencing this and so much more for the rest of my life. Thank you Liz for all your patience, good humor and spunk. You've managed to reignite both my passion for film and romance.