The death of intelligent romantic comedies

The thing is, when we think "romantic comedy" we immediately think of a narrower set of possibilities than a comedy containing or built around one or more romances. We think of the classics that defined the genre. It's one couple. They probably "meet cute" in some way. They may seem to initially dislike one another. As Nora Ephron points out in the WHMS making-of documentary, in the traditional rom-com there are always external obstacles to the couple getting together; in what she calls the "Jewish version," essentially invented by Woody Allen, the obstacle is just the male character's neurosis.

Well, there's no question that this narrow version of the rom-com has been played out. It's tired. To the extent that Hollywood thinks that there is still an audience for it, we're just going to get unsatisfying, derivative movies.

And that is because any good director, and especially those working in independent film, will want to go beyond the played-out, narrow version of the form. They will want to re-invent the genre in some fashion. Love Actually, for instance, focuses on many couples instead of one, and Crazy, Stupid, Love. also makes great use of the same idea, scaled down. Most indie movies inject a lot of drama into the equation, like Sideways.

I've been seeing a lot of movies recently (as in 172 released in the U.S. in 2011, and 75 and still working on 2012). So here's a list of movies that have come out in the last 2-3 years, some quite obscure, all of which have romance and comedy, but which may be recognizable as a "romantic comedy" to a greater or lesser degree. All of them I would recommend, and all but the last without hesitation. I've given the genres according to IMDB (adding "romance" to a few films where it was clearly missing), my grade (out of 100), and (because my taste is not the last word) both the IMDB rating and the Rotten Tomatoes average rating (a better number than the main RT score, and the best single number for critical reception).

I'm a big fan of intelligent films and whenever you see that I've liked the film more than IMDB and RT, assume that the film has smarts and was "too cerebral" for many folks. Sidewalls, for instance, opens with a voice-over documentary lesson on the architecture of Buenos Aires, and then goes on to completely subvert the structure of the standard rom-com (to say more would be to spoil it).

Genres: (C)omedy, (R)omance, (D)rama. The others I've spelled out!

Moonrise Kingdom (CDR). Me: 94, IMDB: 7.8, RT: 8.2.
Beginners (CDR). Me: 93, IMDB: 7.2, RT: 7.3.
Silver Linings Playbook (CDR). Me: 92, IMDB: 7.9, RT: 8.1.
The Artist (CDR). Me: 92, IMDB: 8.1, RT: 8.8.
Bridesmaids (CR). 89, 6.9, 7.6.
Midnight in Paris (C, Fantasy, R). 89, 7.7, 7.8.
The Names of Love (CR). 89, 6.8, 7.1.
Your Sister's Sister (CDR). 88, 6.7, 7.0.
Ruby Sparks (C, Fantasy, R). 86, 7.2, 7.1.
Sidewalls (CDR). 86, 7.2, 6.6.
Crazy, Stupid, Love. (CDR). 86, 7.4, 6.9.
Damsels in Distress (CDR). 84, 5.9, 6.6.
Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara (Adventure, CDR). 84, 7.9, no rating.
Friends With Benefits (CR). 75, 6.6, 6.2

And my all-time favorites, just to give a sense of my taste:

Singin' in the Rain, Manhattan, Annie Hall, The Graduate, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Trouble in Paradise, Greenberg, The Apartment, Secretary, Amelie, Sideways, Punch-Drunk Love, The Philadelphia Story, That Thing You Do, The Palm Beach Story, Groundhog Day, Before Sunset, Moulin Rouge!, Tootsie, Up in the Air.

Prepare your minds for a new scale of physical, scientific values, gentlemen.

Definitely agree. Ironically this movie revived the genre.. and it's been dying a gruesome death ever since. It gets worse and worse every year really. The more it goes, the shallower it gets. No dialog, no plot, no characters. It's basically the movie equivalent of romance paperbacks for women who grew up with a Disney idea of relationships: young sexy people with no personality fighting for a while before having a lot of sex and stupid cliché one-minute conversations.

For every lie I unlearn I learn something new - Ani Difranco

[deleted]

There`s nothing particularly intelligent about this crappy film. And in my experience, most of the good romcoms were made before the year 1950 - films like The Lady Eve, His Girl Friday, Bringing Up Baby remain unsurpassed by anything that the genre has had to offer during the ca 70 years since.



"facts are stupid things" - Ronald Reagan

'As Good As It Gets'. Beautiful and Jack Nicholson is great at depicting someone with OCD.

Karina Licursi ~

Crossing Delancey is another favorite of mine, but alas, also from the 1980s. You are right...we are too jaded, too impatient, too worldly to enjoy little romantic comedies that aren't filled with profanities and sex and talk of sex. Amazing how enjoyable intelligent dialogue and good acting are way better than what is out now

Hey. Don't say that. Meg was in the last semi great romantic comedy and that was Kate & Leopold... almost 10 years ago.

Goddamn. You're right. That's depressing.

A more recent Rom-Com that I found to be quite enjoyable because of it's offbeat nature was Stranger Than Fiction. Will Farrell can wear on me quite quickly, but he was terrific in this. My wife absolutely HATES him, but even she really liked it and agreed he was perfect in the role.