Love is patient, love is kind, love is… Funny and thrilling! No matter your gender, age, or relationship status, you can never go wrong with a rom-com. Rom-coms give us big love stories combined with funny characters and an against-all-odds journeys to find that one soulmate, and they’re the perfect choice when you need some comfort time (and maybe even feeling like shedding a tear or two). Check out this list of the best 11 romantic comedies your heart can’t afford to miss.
Sleepless in Seattle (1993)
This is one of Nora Ephron’s best: a rom-com with a clever script and charismatic leads, and the special bonus is the endless references to one of the greatest romantic movies of all times, An Affair to Remember (1957).
No matter how much kitsch and meetings on the Empire State Building Ephron gives us, she’ll always make us smile.
Chasing Amy (1997)
Ben Affleck, in his best rom-com, plays a guy who falls for his lesbian friend. The ending is clear from the start, but the blend between comic books, a ton of talk about sex, and the mythical Jay and Silent Bob characters, manages to to make it more than just a heartbreak story,
and even teaches us a thing or two about how to deal with the other person’s sexual history.
Silver Linings Playbook (2012)
This movie belongs to the 'old school' rom-com category, the ones that include great acting, heartbreaking dialogues and finally a love that can overcome all obstacles.
Bradley Cooper plays a man returning home after a stint in a mental institute, who meets a woman who's as unstable as he is. Despite the depressing premise the movie avoids being over-dramatic, and tells a wonderful story of two people who almost felt that life had given up on them.
Juno (2007)
In Diablo Cody’s universe even a pregnancy can be funny. Juno is such a lovely, funny and romantic story, that when watching it one forgets the protagonist is in fact a pregnant teenager who’s still in high school.
This movie proves that with a good script, you can make fun of just about anything.
10 Things I hate About You (1999)
Without big-name actors (this was before Heath Ledger rightful rise to stardom), and with a story based on a Shakespearean play (The Taming of the Shrew), this movie succeeded in getting out of the regular high school rom-coms mold, and brings us a fresh angle on the funny, stupid and awful reality of being a teenager.
This is also the movie that proves that paintball is the ultimate date location.
Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001)
Being in love with your boss can make any girl act a little lame. Bridget Jones’s Diary embraces all of this lameness, because we are all a bit of a 'Bridget' sometime. This is the magic in the core of the movie, and why it’s so funny.
And more than that, it even has a romantic message: that whoever truly loves you, will love you no matter how lame or awkward you are.
500 Days of Summer (2009)
In a genre that’s built around the well-known format of a first meeting -> crisis -> catharsis, this movie is almost a complete antithesis. This is exactly why it’s one of the most brilliant and important rom-coms made since Nora Ephron’s masterpieces.
A story about an unattainable girl and a guy that doesn’t believe in love, that is constructed as a nonlinear narrative, moving between the lows and highs that only love can bring.
Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008)
Grotesque characters? Check. Sex jokes? Check. Nudity? Check. Happy ending? Check check check. This movie does the seemingly impossible – because it a men’s rom-com.
While other movies give us the usual neurotic heroine that spends her evenings eating ice crime in front of the tv (until a new hot guy enters her life), Sarah Marshal gives us her male version: a brokenhearted silly hero, that gets stuck in Hawaii with his ex and her douche boyfriend.
Amelie (2001)
With all due respect to Hollywood rom-coms, the biggest experts on love are the French. Amelie is a female version of cupid, and we watch her wandering the streets of Paris, trying to find the lid for every pot.
The average cynical movie watcher might struggle at first to delve into this sugary tale, but it’s worth it, as the sweet taste will stay long after the end of the movie.
Clueless (1995)
Honestly speaking, most romantic ‘comedies’ are not actually funny. It’s difficult to find good movie that manages to be moving without using tear-jerking breakups and dramas.
Clueless is one of the only rom-coms that continues the great When Harry Met Sally tradition and is both funny, romantic - and fun. A real fairytale story about a pretty girl who learns to accept and love her true self, with the help of the guy she loves.
When Harry Met Sally (1989)
With Nora Ephron’s writing, Rob Reiner’s directing, the perfect chemistry of co-stars Billy Cristal and Meg Ryan, and scenes like the iconic deli scene (“I’ll have what she’s having”),
there’s no wonder this story about a friendship that turns into love became a rom-com legend, and it even stood the test of time.