Snuggle up with the one you love with some movies you’ll love
With the observance of Valentine’s Day this week, I have put together a list of some of the best romance films. None of these films are of the sunny Meg Ryan, Michelle Pfeiffer or Sandra Bullock formula.
Each of these films shows a different side of what love is. And while all of these films show great love stories, none of them, I repeat, none of them are chick flicks.
“It Happened One Night” 1934
Winning the Academy Award for Best Picture, this film set the standard for romantic comedies. Claudette Colbert (“Private Worlds”) plays a spoiled heiress who runs away from her family and her arranged marriage.
She soon runs into an out-of-work reporter, played by Clark Gable (“Gone with the Wind”), who helps her navigate the streets of the real world while he tries to turn her plight into a hot headline. Along their humorous travels, they argue, piggy-back, laugh, hitchhike and fall in love.
This film is the fluffiest on the list, and it hits such a romantic bull’s-eye due to its effortless portrayal of the silly qualities of love.
The dialogue between Gable and Colbert is perfect in its timing and subtlety, guaranteeing any viewer to laugh out loud.
Love disregards the boundaries of class and propriety here and reminds us of its exhilarating and infuriating effects.
“Adam’s Rib” 1949
Adam Bonner (Spencer Tracy, “Inherit the Wind”) and his wife Amanda (Katherine Hepburn, “The Philadelphia Story”) are both successful attorneys living happily in New York City.
But when a woman goes to trial for the attempted murder of her husband, both Adam and Amanda take opposite sides on the case. While working fiercely in the courtroom as opposing lawyers, the tenacity of their marriage is tested at home.
Featuring some of the greatest chemistry between two actors, Tracy and Hepburn give lightning-bolt performances. As we see their marriage change while the court case progresses, the film shows the strenuous, aggressive parts of love.
Every bit of dialogue between Tracy and Hepburn is so exquisitely written, and their delivery is consistently sharp and biting, allowing them to shower each other with all their smarts and sass. Sometimes sarcastic and sometimes malicious, “Adam’s Rib” shows us how love can so often endure the problems of life and work.
“Roman Holiday” 1953
Being a monarch can be such a drag. Just ask Audrey Hepburn (“Breakfast at Tiffany’s”), who plays a stifled princess touring the countries of Europe shaking hands with a monotonous string of dignitaries. Fed up with her regimented life, she sneaks out of her room for some unsupervised partying one night and wakes up in a stranger’s bed the next morning.
This stranger (a dashing Gregory Peck, “To Kill a Mockingbird”) is a journalist who soon takes his new friend out for a day on the town while he secretly tries to conduct the most high-profile interview of his career.
As we watch this man and woman enjoy the simple pleasures of eating out, dancing and visiting the sites of Rome, we are reminded of the adventurous and unpredictable nature of love. While their day together nears its end, duty calls for both of them to go their separate ways. But can love keep them together?
This kind of romance strikes a chord in all of us who are living the single college life because we’ve all tasted a fickle, frivolous, brief slice of romance. Love may come and go, but it remains meaningful forever.
“The Graduate” 1967
Sometimes romance can be naughty. Many years before the Zach Braff (“Garden State”) and Alexander Payne (“Sideways”) coming-of-age dramas arrived, there was “The Graduate”.
Dustin Hoffman (“Stranger than Fiction”) stars in his breakthrough role as Benjamin, a bumbling product of the ’60s suffering from the pressures of looming adulthood. After returning home from college, he is soon lured into an affair with Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bancroft, “The Miracle Worker”), a family friend twice his age. A strange turn of events brings Benjamin together with Mrs. Robinson’s daughter, Elaine, offering a different kind of relationship to develop.
This film may not seem like an obvious choice for something romantic. But the love story plays an important part in Benjamin’s growth as we laugh at his endearing awkwardness and then cheer for his exploding confidence. “The Graduate” has a distinctive visual style portraying the groovy mellowness of the 1960s (mostly through blinding sunrays combined with smooth Simon and Garfunkle tunes).
Most importantly, it shows a touching example of how love can help us find ourselves and help us understand what we really want.
“Moulin Rouge!” 2001
This film is not just about any love, but a love that will live forever. “Moulin Rouge” is truly the most unique musical ever created on film. Like a fauvism painting electrocuted into life, the film is bizarre, wild and beautifully inspirational.
Set in Paris at the beginning of the 20th century, the famous courtesan, Satine (Nicole Kidman, “The Others”), risks destroying her lucrative career as a dancer and erotic fantasy maker when she unwittingly falls for Christian, a penniless writer (Ewan McGregor, “The Island”).
Featuring a kaleidoscopic mixture of music from such artists as Nirvana, Elton John, Madonna and U2, it seems that almost every human emotion is expressed through song or dance. Satine and Christian revel in their love despite the rules outlined by Satine’s selfish financier, the Duke. Will their love survive the risks that continually surround them?
The kind of love in this film is brave and strong, willing to face endless danger or painful death. Parading its causes for truth, beauty and freedom, “Moulin Rouge” is a love story impossible to forget.
Casey T. Allen is The Utah Statesman movie critic. Comments can be sent to him at caseyal@cc.usu.edu