Deception and Romanticism in Wedding Crashers

Everything has a horoscope; the key is figuring out in what moment of time that "thing" was born. Although a movie "brews" for a long time—starting with the story and ending with the last-minute edits and re-shoots to please test audiences—the film is "born" when it is released in theaters. Wedding Crashers was released on July 15, 2005. Despite the lack of some critical information that we would find necessary for the analysis of a natal chart for an individual or a nation—such as the rising sign and exact degree of the moon—we can survey how the basic themes of a film correspond with the placement of all the planets and the Sun.

Wedding Crashers is about two divorce mediators (Jupiter in Libra), John Beckwith (Owen Wilson) and Jeremy Grey (Vince Vaughn), who crash weddings, pretending to be someone they're not (sentimental and family-oriented men) to have one-night flings with husband-seeking women. They put many notches on their belts, and at the end of wedding season, they set their eyes on the very lavish wedding of a daughter of Secretary of the Treasury William Cleary (Christopher Walken). Through the charming persona created by Beckwith at this wedding, the duo are invited to the Secretary's home, and ultimately the pair fall in love with the Secretary's other two daughters: Claire (Rachel McAdams), an idealist who worked for Habitat for Humanity, and Gloria (Isla Fisher), a sex maniac.

On July 15, Mercury and Venus in Leo were separating from an opposition to Neptune in Aquarius, and were also in a Grand Fire Trine with Mars in Aries and Pluto in Sagittarius. Hence, we have a kite formation, with the opposition from Neptune adding tension to what would otherwise be a smooth flow of fiery, inspiring energy.

The Venus-Mars-Pluto combination cannot get more sexual. Venus is the planet of love and sensual pleasure; Mars of sexual directness; Pluto of the attraction to sexual taboos, as well as the role of power in sex (witness Vince Vaughn being tied to the bedposts). This Grand Trine relates to the ease with which Beckwith and Grey pick up and bed numerous women. Neptune, of course, throws a loop into this configuration: Beckwith and Grey make all of this work through the use of deception and false personas (Neptune). Mercury opposite Neptune suggests communicating in a deceptive manner (aka lying). The opposition of Venus to Neptune is what makes their conquests so easy, and what eventually pulls them out of this endless sexual loop. They prey upon women who idealize (Neptune) marriage (Venus) and think they have found the man of their dreams; the duo's "front" (Neptune) is based on an elaborate rule-based system that puts the friendship first (Aquarius), which they enact at flashy and extravagant (Leo) weddings (Venus). However, when they themselves fall in love (Venus-Neptune), their system falls apart and actually backfires. Beckwith really falls in love with Claire, and she feels betrayed when she learns that he is not who he said he was (the disappointment that goes along with the Venus-Neptune package, once the fog dissolves). And Grey, ironically, only falls in love with Gloria when he learns that she lied to him about being a virgin.

Ultimately, the bachelors get married. They realize they are "not so young" and that living in the Grand Trine of Easy Sex is fun, but not all that fulfilling. The real challenge, the escape valve out of the trine, is through the opposition to Neptune.

If this is a story of redemption, Beckwith and Grey transform the expression of Neptune in their lives; for when the foggy illusions they have created disappear, and the "fall" of reality sets in (as when Beckwith contemplates suicide in reaction to Claire's refusal to return his phone calls), they move towards the higher expression of spiritual union with the beloved.

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