Is there such a thing as Platonic friends?

"Between men and women there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship"

Look at film alone and you’ll be hard-pushed to find examples of platonic love between a man and woman, and where you do, inevitably one or both characters involved will start to feel a certain je ne sais quoi, a physical attraction, a change in the dopamine levels in their brain, that starts them questioning whether they can remain ‘just’ friends.

All the cool friendships are heterosexual same-sex friendships between the main characters that shine in films like Thelma and Louise, Beaches, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Shawshank Redemption, and that also make us roar laughing like Shaun of the Dead and Bridesmaids.

When it comes to men and women on screen, however, if there is any level of chemistry, inevitably the two parties involved will find out by the end of the film that they just have to be together. Yes, that’s right, we have entered ‘Rom-Com Territory’.

Take When Harry Met Sally, which is 25 years old this summer. Over the course of 12 years, Harry and Sally discover that their feelings for each other — which span expressions of lust, disgust, like and love — mean that they can’t imagine life without this significant other. It is 10 years into this timeline before a friendship properly develops, and two years later again before Harry makes his dramatic confession of love. The rest, they say, is Hollywood history.

So where are we a quarter century and countless romantic comedies later on this question of platonic friendship and romantic courtship? Are we all declaring our long-held love for equally confused and yearning friends at the following standard locations: the wedding (Wedding Crashers — not a surprise that one); on a plane to Vegas (The Wedding Singer); at the airport (Valentine’s Day, Love Actually); standing with a boom box below your beloved’s bedroom window (Say Anything); a New Year’s Eve Party (When Harry Met Sally); at a press conference (Notting Hill — imagine that scenario between some of our squabbling political parties); or in the pouring rain (Pride and Prejudice)?

Have we grown up at all when it comes to telling that ‘we’re just good friends’ special someone how we really feel? Or is Lord Darlington telling us ‘I told you so’, because we realised that lust does not a relationship make and preserving a friendship is more important?

These are the very questions posed by the newest cinematic love story on the block, the soon-to-be-released What If, which features Daniel Radcliffe, as Wallace, the friend secretly in love with Chantry (Zoe Kazan), who has been going out with someone for five years. Already, it’s been dubbed the saviour of the rom-com by the critics. Wallace and Chantry meet at a party — so far so normal — and discover that they have great chemistry... as friends.

While Wallace’s feelings for Chantry are obvious, hers in turn are not so, playing out the grey area of whether their feelings for each other are demonstrative of the passions of a friendship, or what could grow into a passionate love affair. While the story follows the romantic-comedy formula to a tee, What If also poses another question: is it all about timing then? Could that perfect someone be out there but in the arms of another because their paths crossed first?

It’s the same point put to Meg Ryan’s character Sally 25 years earlier in When Harry Met Sally, when her friend, Marie, played by Carrie Fisher, says: “All I’m saying is that somewhere out there is the man you are supposed to marry. And if you don’t get him first, someone else will, and you’ll have to spend the rest of your life knowing that somebody else is married to your husband.” Straight to the point is our Marie.

So what to do then if you feel that the person meant for you is with someone else, and may be planning to walk down the aisle with them? Do you fess up? Sally Cush, a Cork-based counsellor and psychotherapist, says that self-reflection in this situation is key:

“We can and often do feel unhappy in our life and see what we want in our friends — a future wife/husband/job/house/holiday/life and then all our focus goes in that direction: ‘if only I had or was with such and such...’

“It’s when we don’t recognise these needs in ourselves that we get into trouble and get all the messages confused. We tell ourselves the story of ‘happy ever after’ or ‘Soul Mate’, the feel good factor we all want. Especially if we can be handed it all wrapped up with roses and chocolate, sex and feeling all warm and safe.”

So what do you do in the situation — do you let go? And how? The answer is not easily found and involves serious thinking time about what it is that makes you feel this way about the person. And whether it is a reflection, perhaps, of other aspects of your life that are leaving you wanting. Sally suggests asking yourself:

“Is my attraction to another based on the attention this person gives me? Do I feel more attractive in their company? Are my feelings for this person based on a personal need to be seen and valued?

“What can we do to bring in the desired qualities we perceive ourselves to be lacking (and to be available only in another) into our own lives? To begin to find inside what we have been looking for outside? How to help yourself in this situation takes time and personal commitment, but the answers are rarely outside in another.”

Ok, so let’s go back to this friendship malarkey again because, as we know, not all friendships with romantic undertones end with a walk down the aisle. Let’s consider it anew, as the revolutionary step it once was, and still could be. We may take it for granted now, but until the late 1800s traditional social structures allowed for few opportunities for friendships between men and women to develop.

It wasn’t until feminism gained momentum in the last century, giving women independence from the domestic sphere of family, that the expanded potential for friendship between the sexes grew. And as well we know, in many parts of the world, women still don’t enjoy the freedoms that Irish women do, including the possibility to have a platonic friendship with a male.

So in that context, how can we boldly go where few men and woman have gone on film and make platonic friendships the norm? How can we be better friends to each other? Sally believes that platonic friendships are possible but may need some self-awareness and a level of emotional maturity. We study, work, play sports and socialise together, so why not? So go forth, my friends, and make friends, with each other. And if your heart still aches with unrequited love, remember the wise words of Alfred Lord Tennyson: “Tis better to have loved and lost/ Than never to have loved at all.” Not to make light of broken hearts and unfulfilled desires but you could take a leaf out of the works of WB Yeats and Dante Alighieri, who wrote volumes of verse to the women whose affections evaded them.

In Yeats’ case, he wrote volumes of poetry in Maud Gonne’s honour; in Dante’s case, a collection of verse inspired by Beatrice Portinari paved the way for his masterpiece, The Divine Comedy, that 800 years on is still studied. Tortured geniuses, they may have been, but geniuses nonetheless. We still revere their words and their ability to have loved so boldly and so greatly.

* What If is released on August 20.