There are people out there who will tell you they dont like romantic comedies.
You shouldnt be their friend.
Romantic comedies are as old as the movies themselves.
Generation after generation, audiences have sought out stories about the universal appeal (or agony) of love.
And theyve often wanted to laugh at it.
13 Going on 30 (2004)
LoveBigbut find it hasnt aged as well as youd hoped?
Then13 Going on 30is the unproblematic antidote for you!
But is being 30 all its cracked up to be?
A real warm hug of a movie and highly recommended.
So nine years later,Before Sunsetwas something of a surprise.
Of the most lovely sort.
!the movie finds the previously twentysomething romantics as now more practical thirtysomethings.
They accept Vienna was just one magical night, and that theyre older and wiser.
Like a glass of wine during magic hour, it leaves you flush and in anticipation for more.
Writer pair Emily V. Gordon andKumail Nanjianiput their real-life experience on screen in this sharp, funny feature.
Alas, the otherwise perfect beau somehow neglected to mention the fact his family is rich.
DC
Crazy, Stupid, Love.
But guess whos daughter she is…?
Carell and Moore are funny and poignant, while Stone and Goslings chemistry sizzles off the screen.
Rosie Fletcher
Emma.
Taylor-Joy plays rich, smug, meddlesome Emma Woodhouse, the queen bee in her small country village.
Knock half an hour off the slightly baggy run-time and it might have gone from good to truly great.
And you know what?
Make that a mid-2000srom-comNYC, right down to Dr. McDreamy himself as her love interest, Patrick Dempsey.
But they dont seem like a good fit.
Eva is a massage therapist who can lug 35 pounds of equipment up a winding staircase.
Their first date ends with them asking the same question, what is she doing with him?
From the outset, it is apparent Louis-Dreyfus and Gandolfini spark remarkable chemistry.
They are funny, awkward, fallible, and completely believable.
Tony Sokol
Fever Pitch (2005)
What is love if not baseball?
2005sFever Pitchis a love letter to both Americas pastime and to love itself.
Is love the answer?
Always, but not always in the way youd expect.
Being in love isnt just all the warm fuzzies of pure affection.
Its also the devastating, gut-churning sense of complete and total oblivion once that love comes to an end.
Its the perfect package, pardon the pun.
So does director Stephen Frears.
That truth wasnt lost on Nick Hornby either, and he wrote the book.
So why do we root for Ron?
BecauseHigh Fidelityis a romantic comedy that examines how even cads can achieve some level of self-awareness.
Its cathartic if not entirely redemptive.
And in their ways, they help the movie deconstruct the most oblivious key in of arrested development.
with Jack Black and Ted Louiso as aging hipsters with the most obnoxiously entertaining musical tastes.
What are the chances?
Hilarity ensues as one of them tries to woo the girl and the other tries to lose the guy.
Theres an acerbic cynicism to both characters which defies the conventions of the genre.
), and you have an underrated classic.
But ignore all that and think back to the movie underneath that media onslaught.
Theres a reason you watch it every year.
But a description like this doesnt really do Sam and Suzys story, orMoonrise Kingdomas a whole, justice.
Even though I hate the she took her glasses off and now shes beautiful!
movie trope, I can forgive it with this movie.
will resonate with many children and grandchildren of immigrants.
Theingenious comedyPalm Springsfound a way around that problem by uncovering a loophole.
Well, a time loop hole, anyway.
As heavy as that sounds, director Max Barbakow keeps things, if not light, then always entertaining.
Its her tangible sense of humor that makes this movie as amusing as it is swooning.
Of course theyd become proud and prejudiced!
When accompanied by Dario Marianellis exquisitely aching score, its pure movie magic.
DC
Shaun of the Dead (2004)
DirectorEdgar WrightsShaun of the Deadis more than a zom-rom-com.
Its a buddy comedy, a human tragedy, and a satire of the inhuman travesty of modern life.
Simon Pegg plays Shaun, a loser who will never get his shit together.
A zombie apocalypse is just the thing to breathe a little life into an undead relationship.
In most romantic comedies, the eternal man-child grows up and redeems himself.
Shaun not only crawls back to the pub, but brings everyone he loves with him into certain doom.
This might have a lot to do with the casting, includingBradley Cooperas Pat andJennifer Lawrenceas Tiffany.
But thats the thing, the pair believably embody their characters wounded fragilityand never lose the ability to laugh.
They now each live at home with their parents like makeshift avatars of the millennial generation.
Even better, the movies gleeful genre game doesnt undercut the central romance.
