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A good romance can be a defining part of anybody’s life. They can be short-lived and burn bright or slow-simmering and unrequited. They can offer solace, heartbreak, pure joy, and anything in between, all in equal measure and sometimes in a confusing order. So let’s try to chart a course through our own love affair with movies, taking the evolving shape of a relationship’s life cycle, and looking at ten of the ways movies reflect our own romances.
We’ll start at the beginning…
10. First Loves
Ah, first loves! There’s nothing finer, more wondrous, and innocent than those original pangs of love beating in one’s chest. It doesn’t matter where these films highlighting (mostly) youthful adventures into the heart wind up – the point is that they remind us of what it was like to feel those feelings for the first time. These are the loves that all subsequent loves are measured against.
Call Me by Your Name is all gorgeous Italian sun and pushing at one’s own edges to figure out what they are, with one of the best speeches about heartbreak ever put to film. There’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg’s pastel musical version of a young love tested through time and circumstance. There’s the violent versions of Bonnie and Clyde and Badlands, the growing-up-too-fast version of An Education, the extremely dark version of The Virgin Suicides, and the winter romance version of The Bridges of Madison County (which I wholeheartedly believe is a first love movie)…but none of those are quite the point. While Romeo and Juliet is and perhaps always will be the one story that covers all the first love bases (even in the fantastic Ghostlight, which is a version of the Bard’s work from the viewpoint of the young lovers’ grieving parents), we think that Wes Anderson was on to something with…
Moonrise Kingdom
In its simplest terms, Moonrise Kingdom is about two kids on a remote island who fall in love over the course of consecutive summers, and the adventure they undertake in their attempts to run away together. It’s a story that anybody could tell; Wes Anderson, however, is one of the most distinctive directors working, and the look and feel and texture of his films is a defining characteristic of his work. Sometimes it feels like an affectation for the sake of it, but with Moonrise Kingdom, and for our purposes here on this list, the postured formality of his storytelling makes for an incredible first love story.
The film is presented like a memory, with a narrator organizing the story with minimal context. The setting is also presented like a myth, with location names like Summer’s End turning Sam’s journey into a pint-sized odyssey to get to Suzy. A first love should have that kind of outsized importance, and the way the entire island drops what they’re doing because of the ramifications of Sam and Suzy’s love is perfect. If a first love is the one that lingers – the one you never truly get over or forget – then it should live in this sort of gauzy, fantastic memory. Presenting it like a fairy tale is the best format, and Moonrise Kingdom is the perfect marriage of filmmaker and subject for a first love story.
9. Feel-Good Films
Once we’ve achieved first love status, being part of a “feel good” story has to be the next step, doesn’t it? We obviously want these feelings to last, and at minimum, cinema has always felt good about a happily-ever-after ending. The world champion of “everything works out in the end” genres is of course the romantic comedy; old reliable classics like Some Like It Hot, The Philadelphia Story, and Pillow Talk laid the groundwork for later just-as-classics like When Harry Met Sally, Pretty Woman, and Sleepless in Seattle (although if I didn’t balance this rule-of-three list quite right, You’ve Got Mail works better as a companion to Pillow Talk, even if it’s the lesser Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan outing).
But what are the other feel-good categories out there? Dirty Dancing is a doubly nostalgic romance, set in the ’60s and made in the ’80s. There are quirkier romances on offer with Punch-Drunk Love and its two matching lonely hearts. City Lights is silent all-timer made that finds Charlie Chaplin’s Tramp in a whirlwind of farcically delightful near misses. For our number 9, however, let’s go with a modern feel-good romance clearly inspired by the golden age of the Tramp but set in the distant future of…
WALL-E
WALL-E is so many things – a Pixar computer animation masterpiece, a cautionary piece of science fiction, a post-apocalyptic vision (ahem). But as far as we’re concerned, WALL-E is a romance – a warm, funny, and tender look at love in robots that reflects even more about us, not only in actual relationships, but in how we like to model them after what we’ve seen on screen. At this point, what we know of romance culturally is tangled in an “art imitating life imitating art” ouroboros; that WALL-E himself is no different adds to his charm immeasurably.
If indeed we want to feel good about romance by watching feel-good stories on screen, portraying a robot learning how to love by watching romantic comedies is more than just a clever meta-reference; it’s a crucial and brilliant storytelling technique that allows any of us here in the 21st century to empathize with that adorable little trash man. Beyond all of this, however, the romance between WALL-E and EVE literally saves humanity – how’s that for stakes in a rom-com?
8. Odd Couples
Once love has been established, there’s another important step in any relationship; figuring out what kind of couple you are. Movies offer us plenty of pairs that fit perfectly together and only have an obstacle or two in their way, but that’s not what I really want to see on screen. Give me the mismatched duo that needs to make a proper effort for it to work; give me the always entertaining odd couple.
It’s something of a necessity in nearly every stock romance, an element of “when are these two crazy kids going to meet in the middle?” But we’ve got a rich tradition of romantic movies where the oddness in the coupling is not a hurdle, but the point. The Graduate’s summer fling between a kid and his older family friend highlights the difference between “starting out” and “settled down.” There’s Edward Scissorhands’ surreal satire springing from an unlikely romance, or Harold and Maude’s entire-generation-spanning age difference, which is truly one of our favorite on-screen pairings. But what about couples with very real hurdles standing in their way? Lars and the Real Girl’s girl is not a real girl at all, but a stirring romance nonetheless. Her’s love affair between a man and an operating system is as bittersweet as they come, while our number 8 pick is the charming romance between a widow and the spirit of a sea captain in…
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir is one of the more romantic hauntings ever put to film. There is, admittedly, a campiness to the proceedings – a sappiness from that era of filmmaking that remains part of its charm and one of the chief reasons I’m highlighting it here. I just want a little of that classic Hollywood glamour in the mix. Gene Tierney plays a young widow moving from London to a seaside cottage inhabited by the crusty specter of Rex Harrison’s old captain. The gruff, salty dog stands in as stark a contrast to the mannered and headstrong Londoner as the shadowy black-and-white photography, but where the pairing may seem familiar, it’s deployed in such a savvy way here.
Lucy Muir’s determination to make her own life after the death of her husband runs headlong into a literal ghost standing in for the past and future challenges of a widowed woman in turn-of-the-century London. The seaside moodiness hanging over every frame leans hard into the gothic romance at play, but as our supernatural odd couple navigate jealousy, heartbreak, and the simple fact that they can’t touch each other, The Ghost and Mrs. Muir offers a rom-com’s plucky sweetness underneath it all, making them an odd pairing worth aspiring to.
7. Not Lovers But Still Romantic
While we’re on the topic of couples in romantic films, we’d be remiss not to spend a pick on the couples that aren’t actually couples. After all, friendship is just as important as romantic love, so here we look to the realm of platonic love, where a couple are not lovers, but still romantic just the same.
Buddy cop movies get a special shout-out here, especially the ones as homoerotic as Tango and Cash. Bridesmaids tests the connection of two lifelong friends, while Swingers sees a friendship stand in for more of a marriage than anything else. The Banshees of Inisherin counts here as a break-up movie, while Silence of the Lambs’ Clarice gets the kind of personal and professional fulfillment from Hannibal Lecter that she’s missing in the rest of her life. But for the most romantic not-a-couple, we’re going with Sophia Coppola’s look at a lonely stay in Tokyo:
Lost In Translation
I’m not sure there’s a read of this movie that clearly says Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson’s unmoored and disconnected people ever would’ve been romantically involved, but the love and care that deepens between them throughout the film’s runtime is undeniable. Lost in Translation is a testament to the surprise of sudden connection, the wonder of finding someone who’s going through the same thing you are, when on the surface, their circumstances are wildly different. And what better place to explore that idea than a foreign land, where jetlag and a language barrier keep you up all night, and your dreamlike adventures come with the clarity that they may not last forever, but they will change you for the better.
The movie’s climactic, now iconic whispered ending is brilliant for a handful of reasons, but for our purposes on this list, we’ll talk about the blank-slateness of it. What would you say to somebody with whom you’ve shared a moment this important in your life? It’s the romantic version of keeping the shark underwater in Jaws; whatever dialogue anybody could’ve written for that moment can’t possibly be as good as what you can imagine.
6. Second Chances
What’s great – and sometimes terrible – about love is that even when it doesn’t work out, it sticks around long enough to leave the door open for a second chance. Fighting for a second chance, discovering who is worthy of one, and just trying to make one work are all worthy enough endeavors around which to build a romantic movie.
His Girl Friday finds a newspaper man trying to get his wife back from her new husband. There’s a melodramatic May-December variety in All That Heaven Allows. There’s also the second chance happening concurrently in a parallel universe in Sliding Doors. Past Lives is a brilliant look at whether any relationship is itself a second chance on one in a previous life. One of my personal favorites is The Apartment, with Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine putting in all-time great work playing the longing, pain, and ultimately happiness inherent in a second chance story. And if we’re crowning a champion of second chance movies, there aren’t many who could argue against Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; Michel Gondry’s trippy romance about erasing the memory of a relationship oddly gives Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet’s couple an adorable second chance at a first chance. Blue Jay is the complete opposite, following a couple that gets a messy and difficult second chance to connect. But there’s a second chance film that doesn’t get enough play from another subgenre that was thriving way back in the ’90s when my own romance with movies was heating up:
Grosse Pointe Blank
The hitman comedy genre was huge about 30 years ago, but none quite hit the heights of Grosse Pointe Blank. John Cusack’s Martin Blank samples the entire array of second chances as a professional killer attending his high school reunion. It’s funny, infinitely quotable, and has one of the best Alan Arkin supporting roles of all time, but what earns Grosse Point Blank a spot on this list is Martin’s relationship with Minnie Driver’s Debi, the woman he stood up on prom night. Their romance is about forgiveness and honesty and all the things a second chance story needs. The film sets itself apart, however, by the need to get yourself figured out. Martin doesn’t get a free pass, as he’s held accountable for everything he’s done (in their relationship at least; he’s still killed a lot of people). There’s also no real happy ending, just a sense that they’re both continuing to work on things; as far as second chances are concerned, that’s really all you can ask for…that and the killer ’80s soundtrack.
5. Unhealthy Relationships
As we hit the halfway mark, we have to acknowledge that not all romances exist for the best reasons; obsession, jealousy, enablement, and countless other elements of an unhealthy relationship have had their moments on the silver screen.
Phantom Thread is a favorite of mine here, with Daniel Day-Lewis’ Reynolds Woodcock making himself literally unhealthy in the name of romance…but that misses my point a little bit. Vertigo is a look at romantic mania, as Jimmy Stewart’s Scottie molds Kim Novak’s Madeleine into the image of his own trauma. All About Eve works here too, following a manipulative young actor with an added hint of our number 7 category. Days of Heaven’s central romance is built on manipulation and lies as well. Sid and Nancy charts the real-life course of a self-destructive punk rock romance, and the relationship blossoming in A Star Is Born is an unhealthy story no matter what generation remakes the movie. But while we’re swimming in the murky end of the pool, let’s really revel in it with a movie that does a little bit of everything we’ve talked about so far (plus a dash of immortality) and…
Let The Right One In
There’s a very transactional nature to the relationship between the bullied young Oskar and his new neighbor, the vampire Eli. But in the midst of all the bloodshed and blood leaking, there’s a sweetness to it as well. More than that, it’s a portrait of two outcast kids who find each other. The loneliness each of them endures makes them a match, and what they need from the other fits together like a morbid puzzle.
What’s brilliant about the film, though, is the moodiness of a cold Swedish landscape, the brutality of Oskar’s tormenters, and the tinges of darkness around nearly every character we meet, all blended together to create a world where you can’t help but root for these kids…or this kid and this vampire, I guess. But there’s nothing good that will ever come out of this coupling – only more blood and death. That they have as good a chance as any couple we’ve mentioned in this list to live a long life together makes the film undeniably romantic…in a bit of an unhealthy way, of course.
4. Feel-Bad Films
We’ve opened the door to negative thoughts in our exercise to build a romance, Frankenstein style: Should I even keep doing this? Would I have been better off not starting this romance in the first place? Maybe it’s time we look at the romantic films where things don’t work out; after all, as soaring and wonderful as a romance can be, what happens when the lovers don’t end up together?
This is perhaps most famously pulled off on a hill of beans in Casablanca. There are non-life-or-death versions of feel-bad romances in 500 Days of Summer and La La Land. Queer cinema has perhaps more than its share of films that qualify here, like the brief and doomed-from-the-start love affairs in Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Carol, and Brokeback Mountain. Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire even takes a tragic ending to a love story into heavenly territory, with an angel giving up his immortality in the name of romance, while Atonement disguises itself as a happy ending for a minute with nothing but feel-bad vibes by the end. Wong Kar-wai’s In the Mood for Love is one of the greatest studies of a tragic near-miss romance of all time, brilliantly and gorgeously rendered with a sumptuous color palette accompanying the tortured relationship of two people whose spouses have abandoned their vows. But there’s a film to which every one of these honorable mentions owes a debt: David Lean’s heartbreaking…
Brief Encounter
Before he did The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia, and Doctor Zhivago, David Lean concerned himself with something just as epic, even if it seems to function on a smaller scale. Brief Encounter follows two married people connecting over a simple piece of grit stuck in an eye. The chance meeting blossoms into flirtatious rendezvous before becoming a forbidden love, and all the while there’s the anguish of knowing everything they’re feeling is an impossible fantasy. There’s an everyday quality to the proceedings as well; there’s nothing glamorous about the pair, and the slow, almost casual pace in which their good-natured laughing turns to tortured longing feels universal.
The obviously strong emotions are kept at bay; shame and fear dictate their actions, not their hearts and desires. Neither of the participants seem particularly unhappy, nor are they caught in dire circumstances from which they deserve to escape; they don’t even seem bored or trapped by mundanity. What’s on display in Brief Encounter is the sudden spark of romance in the wrong time and place, a tragedy photographed in gorgeous black and white through the steam of a railway station.
3. Falling Out of Love
As we wind down with our last few picks and away from Brief Encounter’s grueling almost-affair, it’s time to put Tennyson’s quote to the test. Is it better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all? Romance doesn’t always work out, and we can’t just look at the happy endings if we’re aiming for cinema’s definitive studies of the subject. As such, a good movie about falling out of love is a necessary addition.
Ingmar Bergman made the foremost epic on the topic with Scenes from a Marriage. Blue Valentine charts the downward trajectory of a relationship, while Revolutionary Road does the same with suburban life in the ’40s and ’50s, and Eyes Wide Shut puts a marriage and the entire idea of fidelity to the test with ambiguous results. Marriage Story and Kramer vs. Kramer center their crumbling relationships around custody disputes, but it’s hard to argue that anybody ever did it better than director Mike Nichols and co-stars Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in…
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Taking place over the course of one very long night in which veteran drinkers George and Martha welcome young professor Nick and his wife Honey into their home, the film’s ensuing emotional warfare has been famous (or infamous?) since Edward Albee’s play debuted. What I love about it, particularly for this category, are the stakes risen to incalculable heights; what is romance if not us at our biggest, our most passionate, with our most sharpened and vulnerable edges on display?
The show that George and Martha put on for their younger counterparts – the games they play and the lengths they’re willing to go to hurt each other – reveals the intense levels of passion in the torment they inflict. As the younger couple bears witness to the long simmering anger, they begin to fall victim to it as well, seeing their own seams split under the weight of it. It is, of course, revealed that George and Martha have their reasons, but outwardly they project a complete lack of love. For Nick and Honey, being confronted by all the things they’re missing out on by not being in a great romance makes for a difficult lesson to learn and a fascinating juxtaposition to watch.
2. Dealing with Exes
Now that we’re well and truly out of love, the next step is adding another name to our list of exes. Jeez, how romantic is this top 10 romantic movies list getting, right? Break-ups, as I said, are part of the life cycle of a romance as much as falling head-over-heels, and a ton of great movies have been built on a premise involving an ex-partner.
High Fidelity is a dramedy examination of an entire list of exes, ranking them in a way that feels relatable enough to us for some reason…(ahem)…but this version of John Cusack belongs in the second chances category about as much as his previously discussed hitman incarnation. The Invitation’s horror is set up by having to face a former relationship, as it is in The Invisible Man, where the bad relationship is the monster from which escape proves difficult. Mrs. Doubtfire qualifies here too, as does Midsommar, but my number 2 pick is the good old-fashioned French husband-killing thriller…
Diabolique
The story of a woman getting rid of an archetypally terrible husband by conspiring with his mistress is outstanding thriller material on its own. Henri-Georges Cluzout’s follow-up to The Wages of Fear ratchets up the guilt right alongside the tension, charting the dissolution of a marriage in ways as violent and nerve-wracking as driving nitroglycerin through the jungle. But the interesting thing about Diabolique – at least where its inclusion on a list of romantic movies is concerned – is how it approaches the idea of getting out of a bad relationship.
The plot twists and turns as a good thriller should, but the revelations begin to make the movie about a nasty break-up. Christina and Michel’s marriage is by all accounts an awful one, made that way pretty exclusively by Michel’s complete shittiness. But in spite of his obvious villainy, Diabolique eventually tells us that ending a relationship can often hurt everybody involved, not least of which the half of the couple that doesn’t deserve it. That it’s telling us this while employing plot elements like murder, poisons, and manipulations is the thriller icing on a break-up movie cake. It’s a great example of why some movies are talked about for decades while others are not. Were it just a capable thriller, it would be fun enough; Diabolique, however, is a thriller that can be interpreted in any number of ways, especially as an entry in the Bad Romances Hall of Fame.
1. Epic Loves
Here we are at number 1, and it’s time to go big before we go home. We veered for perhaps too long into the bad side of romance, so let’s wrap things up with movies about love itself. These are stories where neither the sweeping scale nor the years that pass can rend the relentless and unbreakable bonds of true, unconquerable love; these are the epic loves.
David Lean’s had a shout-out already with one of the all-time greats in Doctor Zhivago, while Joe Wright’s Anna Karenina is an admirable successor in the sweeping Russian romance genre. The Princess Bride is all about the swashbuckling fairytale aspect of romance, while Titanic has the sheer historical scale (and while the gift of Jack’s love for Rose endured, Jack did not). Bram Stoker’s Dracula is a love story that spans lifetimes; the Before Trilogy is the more grounded version spanning part of a lifetime but covering a lot of the same bases. The Notebook naturally gets more than a passing mention here as a universally heartbreaking cinematic experience that’s epic if only for its place in pop culture history. But the epic love story that gets me every time is Darren Aronofsky’s eon-spanning…
The Fountain
Literally taking place over 1000 years, the search for eternal life consumes a man in his quest to avoid ever losing his love. The tale is gorgeously realized with visual motifs connecting: Tomás, a conquistador in 1500; Tommy, a medical researcher in 2000; and Tom, a lonely astronaut in 2500. This film proves that you do not need AI to bring different time periods to life, DARREN. The Fountain deals with love’s role in human nature as something that never changes. We have always been and will always be both terrified of death and completely dependent on love, and the quest to conquer both of those instincts is at the center of the film. Tomás, Tommy, and Tom (Hugh Jackman) destroy themselves while searching for a way to give Isabella and Izzy (Rachel Weisz) the gift of eternal, devoted love, making it one of the most epic romantic movies of all time.
