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Tag Archives: romantic comedies
New On DVD: Crazy, Stupid, Love
Crazy, Stupid, Love (2011), directed by Glenn Ficarra and John Requa, is a romantic comedy in which all the principle actors play upon their strengths. Just like in The 40 Year Old Virgin (2005), Steve Carell is once again a clueless schmuck in need of a makeover. He also reprises his Date Night (2010) persona as a suburban husband and father who needs to spice up his marriage. There are also numerous similarities to his Michael Scott character in The Office, with inappropriate outbursts of personal information and an overall embarrassing demeanor. However, just as in all the above-mentioned film and TV roles, Carell is completely loveable and we want to see his character succeed.
Julianne Moore’s role as Emily is also similar to those she has played before. She’s unhappy in her marriage to the point of infidelity just like Jules in The Kids are All Right (2010), and on the verge of an emotional breakdown similar to her role in Magnolia (1999). In both films and in this one, her tears seem raw and believable. She’s broody and bored like Charley in A Single Man (2009), and her seemingly perfect married life is on the brink of crumbling just like that of her character Cathy Whitaker in Far From Heaven (2002).
Ryan Gosling plays his usual heartthrob self and Emma Stone’s character is honest and relatable with a comedic flair similar to her role as Olive in Easy A (2010). This movie also welcomes the up and coming star Analeigh Tipton as the teenage babysitter with an unquenchable crush. She will be familiar to anyone who watches America’s Next Top Model, as she made it to the top three of Cycle 11, only to be let go with the advice to become an actress, which this movie proves she has done quite successfully.
While slow in spots, the surprise twist at the end of Crazy, Stupid, Love is well worth the wait. The stars may play up their strengths, but the result of that foresight is a very enjoyable love story.
Photo © vgstudio – Fotolia.com
Tagged Crazy, DVD, Julianne Moore, Love, romantic comedies, romcom, Steve Carell, Stupid
Romantic Comedies With Unexpected Endings
500 Days of Summer (2009)
This movie starts off as almost all romantic comedies do. A man and woman meet, and one likes the other but the other isn’t sure. In time they begin a romantic connection that comes to a halt at a major crisis point. What makes this movie different—aside from its circular timeline and the fact that the stereotypical gender roles are reversed—is that this crisis point alters the storyline in a way that most other films do not. Will Tom (Joseph Gordon Levitt) and Summer (Zooey Deschanel) find their happily ever after? Watch the movie to find out.
The Breakup (2006)
The love story between Brooke (Jennifer Aniston) and Gary (Vince Vaughn) is summarized at the beginning of the film with one scene and a montage of photos. It’s what happens at their crisis point that makes the plot of the entire movie. While their crises are small and thus relatable, mostly about who does the dishes, the center of the plot follows how they deal with their tension and whether or not to keep the relationship going. Knowing that the ending is unexpected may have the reader assume that they go their separate ways, but one much watch the film in its entirely to see how things wrap up, or if they even do.
My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997)
This movie was perhaps the frontrunner of altering the romantic comedy plotline. Jules (Julia Roberts) tries to win the affection of ex-boyfriend Michael (Dermot Mulroney) after he has proposed to another girl. As many movies before it, funny and heart wrenching twists turn Jules’s quest into a drawn out affair. In the end everyone is happy, but only because Jules’s “gay boyfriend”—the first one introduced in a major motion picture—alters the plot in a way no one imagined.
Photo © Ghen – Fotolia.com
Best Romantic Comedy Scenes
The dance scene in The Wedding Planner
When it’s revealed that Steve “Eddie” Edison (Matthew McConaughey) is engaged, Mary (Jennifer Lopez) confronts him on the dance floor in an impromptu tango routine. Because the scene takes place at a dance studio during a ballroom lesson, it doesn’t reach the cheese factor present in so many “impromptu” dance scenes that feature unrealistic synchronized movements between a plethora of characters. While the confrontation itself is fairly typical, watching the elegance and grace of these two star actors turns what would be a scene filled with mundane dialogue into a movie moment that is not easily forgettable.
The “she’s pregnant” scene in The Object of My Affection
The Object of My Affection has many ballroom dancing scenes, but the quick-paced back and forth comes in an earlier part of the movie when Nina (Jennifer Aniston) is outed as pregnant to her family and fiancé by her best friend George (Paul Rudd). The entire scene takes place in the kitchen, but in the space of just a couple of minutes, all six characters plus the downstairs neighbor have quick-paced lines that also out George as gay, Nina’s sister as a forgettable “second wife,” Nina’s boyfriend as about to be dumped, and Nina’s brother in law as suffering from food poisoning—all centered around Nina opening windows and getting a fan to combat the heat and humidity.
The cold scene in You’ve Got Mail
Joe Fox (Tom Hanks) and Kathleen Kelly (Meg Ryan) use neither fast-paced banter nor dancing in their best scene. Rather, it’s the subtleties of their body language as they deliver their lines. Ryan has sneezing fits, covers her mouth when she regrets saying something, gesticulates wildly with her hands, stomps her foot when Joe gives her flowers, and almost falls asleep. But the scene also has some just plain killer lines:
Fox: “Tea?” Reaches for tea.
Kelly: “Yes. I was upset, and horrible.”
Fox: “Honey?” Reaches for honey.
Kelly: “Yes.”
Fox: “I was the horrible one.”
Photo © Bocos Benedict – Fotolia.com
Greatest Romantic Comedies Of All Time
They may be very generic (boy meets girl, then there’s a complication), and more sugary than candyfloss, but we fall for sweet, heart-warming romantic comedies every time. You know you’re going to get a happy ending, and be left feeling good, so romcoms are a safe bet, for nights in or out. No wonder some of them are among the biggest selling films of all time.
Sometimes the lead pair are involved with each other at first, but then have to face challenges in order to be together. Maybe one (or even both of them) already has a partner, or there are social pressures. A key part is the time spent alone as the pair work out their feelings or how to overcome the obstacles to their relationship.
Interestingly, while romcoms do have to end happily, it’s not necessarily always about the main couple living marrying or ending up living together happily ever after.
Sometimes, a different love match will be made between one of the main characters and a secondary one, such as in My Best Friend’s Wedding. The recurring theme is the affirmation of the importance of love in the protagonists’ lives, even if, as in Roman Holiday and Shakespeare in Love, the hero and heroine are physically apart by the end.
Often, romantic comedies bring together a couple who, at least at first, represent polar opposites. They may meet in unusual or funny circumstances, or there may be an initial clash of personalities or beliefs.
So many romantic comedies have stood the test of the years, and the highest grossing ones include 1997’s As Good As It Gets, starring Jack Nicholson as an obsessive-compulsive novelist, with Helen Hunt as the single mother of an asthmatic son, and My Big Fat Greek Wedding which took $241.4 million, although it never reached number one at the box office while it was on release. (It is the highest-grossing film to accomplish this feat).
Julia Roberts stars in no fewer than four of the highest grossing romantic comedy movies – Pretty Woman, My Best Friend’s Wedding, Runaway Bride and Notting Hill, while Hugh Grant is the male lead in two of them – Notting Hill and Love Actually, which looks at myriad different aspects of love through 10 separate plots, many of which turn out to be connected as the stories progress.
Then, of course, everyone loves There’s Something About Mary, the 1998 picture directed by the Farrelly brothers, and starring Matt Dillon, Ben Stiller and Cameron Diaz, which is both gross out movie and romcom. Like ‘that’ diner scene in When Harry Met Sally, its infamous ‘zipper incident’ has passed into movie legend.
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