Dalton and Dr. Elizabeth Clay’s meet cute is a very sexy scene, if you ask me, which by reading this blog you have in effect done. A lot goes into making it sexy, too. You start with Patrick Swayze and Kelly Lynch, two extremely attractive human beings. From there you step to the difference in their sexiness: Swayze’s Dalton, shirtless, exposed, vulnerable yet also tough in his willingness to be vulnerable, to be exposed, to be shirtless; Lynch’s Doc, whose intense French braid, enormous glasses, and shapeless white coat emphasize rather than obscure her beauty, as if you’d put glasses and a lab coat and a wig from a Halloween store on the Venus de Milo. There’s the intimacy of the scene too, of the act of a woman touching and healing a man wounded by physical contact with other men, sublimated eroticism piled on sublimated eroticism like they’re fucking. There’s the BDSM angle in the form of the Pain Don’t Hurt koan and the power-exchange positioning of their bodies and faces. Maude Lebowski might suggest that Dalton’s wound is highly vaginal. I for one have pulled off that lapsed-Catholic trick of eroticizing blasphemy, so if you remember where Christ was wounded you’ve got that going for you as well.
But the sexiest thing about it is Elizabeth’s voice when she pauses on her way out of the exam room, turns, and says “You know…for that line of work I thought you’d be bigger,” and Dalton’s utterly guileless smile and laugh before he responds with a self-effacing “Gee, I’ve never heard that before.” Man oh man are these two into each other! You can hear it! Elizabeth’s voice is so soft, almost tremulous with the curiosity that caused her to stop and turn back towards her patient. (She’s like Lot’s wife if Lot’s wife dodged the salt thing and got to go back to town and fuck.) Dalton is delighted to hear this fascinating woman, his intellectual and physical peer, say something he’s heard a million times before—it means he can contextualize her as a part of his life now, even if things don’t work out, and for the moment that’s good enough for him. Do we ever see Dalton close his eyes with pleasure like he does here, at any other point in the movie? Not that I can think of. Do we ever hear anyone say “I thought you’d be bigger” with such directness and wonder—not some weird power-trip come-on, not bants between the lads, but just a person sizing up another person they’re attracted to, in that person’s presence? No way. Woof, man, these two are hot for each other, and it leaks out of them and into their voices as they say goodbye. They know they’ll be saying hello again soon.
Tags: dalton, dr. elizabeth clay, elizabeth clay, i thought you'd be bigger, road house