By Team Empire | Posted 14 Oct 2019

Love comes in all shapes and sizes, not least when it's being projected tall and wide on the silver screen. Some of the movies that are easiest to fall head-over-heels in love with are the ones about people falling head-over-heels for each other – from the high-stakes drama of The Notebook to the delicate summertime sweetness of Call Me By Your Name_._ Swoon. We’ve channelled our inner romantics to present Empire’s list of the 60 Best Romantic Movies.

60. Love Actually

What, exactly, was Richard Curtis trying to say with Love Actually? It’s alright to deliver secret love messages to your newly-wed best mate’s wife? Husbands will eventually cheat on you with younger mistresses? It’s somehow okay to keep calling Martine McCutcheon fat even though she categorically isn’t? Who cares: it’s (mostly) good fun, it’s the only decent Christmas film for the last 15 years, and the airport-dash finale smooths over all the sour bits. Plus the final scene with Bill Nighy and his manager is guaranteed to thaw a frozen heart!

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59. Ghost

Can you make pottery sexy? Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore can. Jerry Zucker, better known as one third of the Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker comedy trio, mixes laughter with just the right amount of tears, and Swayze is the ideal romantic hero, who comes back after he’s murdered to check on his grieving ex. Much more than a trivia question answer (‘for which film did Whoopi Goldberg win an Oscar?’), Ghost wins at life, and life after death.

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58. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

99.percent of romance films would be better off with a few kung fu fights and bass guitar battles, and Edgar Wright’s hyper-stylised graphic novel adaptation is packed with them. The titular Canadian slacker literally fights off the past lovers of new beau Ramona Flowers, facing her seven evil exes in Street Fighter-inspired brawls where the ultimate special moves are the powers of love and self-respect.

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57. Love, Simon

Director Greg Berlanti is better known right now as the big boss of the Arrowverse on US TV (and approximately 736 other shows), but his second film is a subtle, funny exploration of a young man's romantic journey. Simon (Nick Robinson) has been hiding being gay from his classmates and family (even though they're understanding and loving), but when his secret is discovered and he's threatened with exposure, he decides to embrace the love of another young guy who reaches out clandestinely.

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56. Bridget Jones’s Diary

Renee Zellweger’s heroine was way ahead of her time on the big pants and novelty Christmas jumper front, but elsewhere this loose adaptation of Helen Fielding’s novel-in-diary-entries is a time portal to the early 00s: Hugh Grant and Colin Firth at peak dreaminess, gags about 'Saddam Hussein’s arse', and the pre-internet concept of actually keeping a physical diary.

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55. The Wedding Singer

More discerning cineastes might choose Punch-Drunk Love as Adam Sandler’s best romance film — but the rest of us will stick with The Wedding Singer, Billy Idol cameo and all. Sandler and Drew Barrymore make a charming will-they-won’t-they couple, and it goes one step further than the typical catch-them-at-the-airport climax by getting all parties onto the plane for a big ol’ singalong.

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54. The Way We Were

Basically an anti-romance, Sydney Pollack’s melodrama stars Robert Redford and Barbra Streisand as a couple who were never suited to each other and didn’t end up staying together. Opposites attract, but they don'’ necessarily work out. The story, however, told mostly in flashback, somehow still manages an elegiac tone, and demonstrates that there were some good times in there somewhere. Focusing as it does on people trying to make a relationship work despite bitterly divided politics, it also now seems quite timely again. The maudlin title song is one of the biggest hits of all time.

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53. Cyrano De Bergerac

“Mon nez! C’est enorme!” Gerard Depardieu’s casting as the unrequited romantic of Edmond Rostand’ classic play is (ahem) right on the nose, and director Jean-Paul Rappeneau just lets him rip: chewing the scenery one moment and tugging the heartstrings the next. His tour-de-force performance is larger than life: much like the facial proboscis that keeps him from his great love Roxane. Until it doesn’t after all, and everyone lives happily ever after. The definitive version of the story, but Steve Martin’s Americanised Roxanne, released three years earlier, gives it a run for its money.

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52. Sliding Doors

Peter Howitt’s high concept romantic comedy might hinge on how much you’re wanting double the Gwyneth Paltrow, but she still manages to make you root for her (and at no point tries to to sell you magic vagina eggs). She’s Helen, who catches a tube train – or doesn’t – and the film follows the romantic misadventures across parallel storylines. It refuses to rely on the gimmick, and both Paltrow and John Hannah make respectably adorable leads.

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51. The Notebook

The high-water mark of Nicholas Sparks adaptations, this sweeping weepie aims firmly for the tear-ducts. Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams are the young lovers separated through the years by prejudice, World War II, and eventually dementia in a film meticulously designed to leave viewers drowning in a pool of their own tears.

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50. Chasing Amy

Kevin Smith’s Gen X indie rom-com depicts an obviously-doomed dalliance between comic book artist Holden (Ben Affleck) and lesbian Alyssa (Joey Lauren Adams). Its sexual politics are hopelessly outdated, but the pop culture-literate screenplay (the Jaws-inspired scene swapping sexual scars, the Star Wars racism rant) is still one of Smith’s best.

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49. A Star Is Born

It might be the third remake of this story – after Janet Gaynor and Fredric March in 1937, Judy Garland and James Mason in 1954 and Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson in 1976 – but the love still feels brand new. Bradley Cooper marks his directorial debut and also stars as leading man Jackson Maine here, a hardened, alcoholic country musician who mentors and very quickly falls in love with a rising star of a singer, Ally, played by Lady Gaga in a major dramatic turn. There’s heaps of chemistry between the two, as much in music and lyrics as through whispered sweet nothings. As with many great loves, there’s also great sorrow – but that only makes the romance all the more affecting.

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48. Titanic

Yes, yes, we all know that Jack could’ve easily fit on the floating door. Geometric frustrations aside, James Cameron’s spectacular disaster movie is anchored by a cheesy but gripping class-busting love affair that gives a human scale to the catastrophe. Bonus points for quite literally the steamiest sex scene ever committed to film.

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47. William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet

Shakespeare: the dead English guy with the massive ruff knew how to write a good romance, even if he over-did it on the downer endings. Baz Luhrmann brought his explosive visual pizzazz to the original star-crossed lovers, decking the Montagues and Capulets out with Hawaiian shirts, pistols, and a colour scheme that even most nineties pop groups would describe as 'a bit garish’.

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46. Obvious Child

Far from obvious, this showcase for the comedic (and dramatic) talents of Jenny Slate has more on its mind than just a simple rom-com, but the love story that forms part of its heart is still successful. Sharp, funny and feeling, this isn't just Juno-meets-Girls but a smart film that tackles real-life issues with rare frankness.

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45. The 40 Year-Old Virgin

Judd Apatow’s cinematic debut tore a new patch in the Hollywood landscape like a wax strip off Steve Carell’s exceedingly hairy chest. The 40-Year-Old-Virgin defined the next decade of mainstream American comedy (crude, largely improvised, ultimately sweet), an era perfectly characterised by Andy's charming search for true love, peppered with eye-wateringly sharp gags.

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44. Sleepless in Seattle

These days far-flung romances between people who have never met result in dramatic Catfish confrontations on MTV. But in 1993, Nora Ephron spun it into an exceedingly wholesome rom-com where the grieving Sam (Tom Hanks, 'sleepless in Seattle') and unsatisfied Annie (Meg Ryan, 'bored in Baltimore') form a bond through radio broadcasts and typewritten letters. It’s somewhat less heartwarming for poor Walter, whose fiancée ditches him for someone she’s never laid eyes on.

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43. Truly, Madly, Deeply

Think Ghost, but British. And without the pottery. It’s the heartbreaking story of Nina (Juliet Stevenson), grieving the loss of boyfriend Jamie (Alan Rickman) when he returns to her life in supernatural form. Anthony Minghella, but the pair burn with chemistry.

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42. Up

Pixar quietly delivers emotional devastation in the opening five minutes of Up, a mini-masterpiece of an ordinary, extraordinary love-filled lifetime between soulmates Carl and Ellie. But the rest of Carl’s South American adventure as a pensioner is also shot through with a sense of romance. Don’t even bring up the scrapbook scene, which offers the animation studio’s most profound meditation on what true love really looks like.

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41. The African Queen

A Hollywood classic with one foot in Britain and the Ealing Comedy tradition, The African Queen manages to make a romance out of a WWI suicide mission. Katharine Hepburn is the Methodist missionary who convinces rough-and-ready captain Humphrey Bogart to refit his steamboat for a dangerous journey down the Ulanga River for a torpedo attack against the Germans. And who wouldn’t be seduced by a line like that? John Huston directed when he could be distracted from shooting the local fauna – if Clint Eastwood’s biopic White Hunter, Black Heart is to be believed.

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40. Carol

Todd Haynes never lets the lush period setting get in the way of the story for this one, which sees Phyllis Nagy adapt a Patricia Highsmith novel in which – surprise! – no one is murdered. It’s soulful and settled, while never denying the churning emotions between young photographer Therese (Rooney Mara) and the glamorous, tragic Carol (Cate Blanchett).

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39. The Big Sick

Undoubtedly the best screen romance where half of the couple spends most of the runtime in a coma. Kumail Nanjiani and his wife Emily V. Gordon adapted the rocky, illness-stricken beginnings of their own real-life relationship into a contemporary culture-clash rom-com with life-or-death stakes. Less crude than most Judd Apatow-poduced films, while still boasting a belter 9/11 gag.

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38. Say Anything

Cameron Crowe made his directorial debut with the film after proving he had a keen ear for realistic and memorable dialogue in previous work. John Cusack is the instantly iconic Lloyd Dobler, while Ione Skye is more than a capable romantic foyle. John Mahoney (who recently died) is the secret weapon as the father of Skye’s Diane Court. It’s clear-eyed about the torturous path that love can take and features moments that linger longer than most, including the much-referenced boombox scene.

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37. Dirty Dancing

Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze's sizzling chemistry steams up the screen in this eighties banger-laden ode to summer flings, pissing off your parents, and doing whatever it takes to end up in the ludicrously buff arms of a fit dance instructor. Warning: don’t attempt the famous climactic lift unless you’re ripped like Swayze.

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36. Shaun of the Dead

Edgar Wright’s big-screen debut still has heart and brains like any other rom-com, but smears it across the faces of hundreds of zombie extras. A film about choosing to commit to your girlfriend, growing out of your twenties and ditching the dregs of your record collection (“The Batman soundtrack? Throw it!”), Shaun of the Dead is Richard Curtis put through a mincer.

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35. (500) Days Of Summer

Though it occasionally leans a little too heavily on the guy's side of a relationship, Summer remains a fantastic exploration of human connection. Stand-out moments include Joseph Gordon-Levitt's Tom in a giant post-coital dance number, and great work from Zooey Deschanel as his titular paramour.

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34. Manhattan

Currently undergoing a process of being critically downgraded thanks to its protagonist’s far from comfortable fixation on a much younger woman, Manhattan still has loads to offer. As much as it’s about off-kilter interpersonal relationships, it’s also, famously and arguably much more successfully, Woody Allen’s most passionate love letter to the city of New York and the music of George Gershwin. "New York was his town, and it always would be," is the line he lands on at the beginning, as Rhapsody in Blue explodes into life and fireworks illuminate the skyline. And it’s a hard heart that resists being swept along.

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33. Paterson

Some would think to write off Paterson as simply That Film Where Adam Driver Drives A Bus And Writes Poetry. But some would be wrong. At its core is the deep, if sometimes troubled relationship between Driver's Paterson and Golshifteh Farahani Laura. This is love, Jim Jarmusch-style.

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32. La La Land

There are two romances going on here: the one between Ryan Gosling’s ivory-tinkling musician Sebastian and Emma Stone’s wide-eyed actress Mia, and the one between director Damien Chazelle and his beloved city of Los Angeles. Beyond the jazz-splaining is a charming, toe-tapping (and yes, swooningly romantic) musical — just beware its heart-shattering encore.

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31. Roxanne

Not many romantic comedies starring Steve Martin can claim to be based on an 1897 verse play…. In fact, this is the one, which adapts and updates Cyrano de Bergerac for an eighties audience. Martin is CD “Charlie” Bales, who pines for Daryl Hannah’s Roxanne, but despite an abundance of charisma, is held back by his large nose. When he helps a fireman friend woo her, complications arise… There is much mistaken identity and frustrations on the path to true love, but even though you know where the story is headed, the light touch and sheer charm of the cast carries it.

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30. Secretary

Long before Fifty Shades whipped audiences into a frenzy, there was Steven Shainberg's odd indie romance. James Spader (because of cause it's him, and he's even called Mr. Grey!) is the boss who hires the troubled Lee Holloway (a bedraggled Maggie Gyllenhaal, who slowly blossoms into luminosity) and discovers a kindred spirit in kink. But it's more than cheap S&M titillation, showing two damaged people finding deep, comforting love with each other.

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29. Once

Musician-turned-director John Carney brings a lyrical reality to this story of a street busker/hoover repairman (Glen Hansard) and a flower-flogging immigrant (Markéta Irglová), who meet on the street and end up making beautiful music together. The soundtrack became a huge hit, and the romance is grounded in detail.

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28. The Philadelphia Story

A triumphant comeback for Katharine Hepburn after a string of disappointments. The original Broadway play was written specifically for her, and she oversaw its adaptation with the support of Howard Hughes. The film sees her torn between accepting the affections of Cary Grant or James Stewart – and if the idea of that love triangle wasn’t already tantalising enough, it’s actually a square (quadrangle?) since John Howard is in there too. George Cukor’s breezy direction captures the immense fun that all involved were apparently enjoying in real life.

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27. The Shape Of Water

Only Guillermo del Toro could propose a romance between a human woman and the Creature from the Black Lagoon and elevate it beyond something you’d find on Pornhub. Sally Hawkins is endlessly charming as Elisa, effortlessly selling her wide-eyed attraction to Doug Jones’ scaly, egg-scoffing leading ‘man’. It’s so heart-floodingly romantic, you’ll forget about the cat corpses left in its wake.

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26. Her

Joaquin Phoenix falling for an Alex-alike operating system in the near future? You could scoff, but Spike Jonze and his cast (including Scarlett Johansson as the phone-based crush) make it work with real emotion. It's the Black Mirror movie you never knew your heart desired.

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25. Notting Hill

Richard Curtis’ Four Weddings follow-up is pure fantasy: its romance between an everyman and a Hollywood star is only slightly more believable than the concept of affording a flat in Notting Hill from the profits of a second-hand book shop. But the film’s charms are irresistible — Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts at career peaks, a Curtis script packed with classic lines (“I’m just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her”), and some stonking product placement for Horse & Hound magazine.

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24. Cold War

Polish auteur Pawel Pawlikowski returns with a sophisticated, devastating love affair that spans countries and decades in Cold War. Zula (Joanna Kulig) sings, Winter (Tomasz Kot) listens, they connect. The attraction is instant, but the unstable political landscape tears their relationship apart time and time over. In jazz clubs and work camps, they cross crowds to find each other in a glorious black and white romantic portrait of a lifetime – that somehow is still under 90 minutes.

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23. God’s Own Country

Johnny (Josh O’Connor), the twentysomething son of an ailing sheep farmer (Ian Hart), doesn’t expect much from his life in rural Yorkshire beyond several pints and an anonymous bunk-up. But his perfunctory existence is turned upside-down when Romanian farmhand Gheorghe (Alec Secareanu) arrives for lambing season. A dig into the nature of humanity from Francis Lee, a director already fluent in the language of brutality and tenderness. A stunning love story that in its finest moments is pure poetry.

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22. Long Shot

Playing off the idea of the unlikely couple, Long Shot delivers more laughs and more authentic emotion than you might think. It's thanks to some sparky, easy chemistry between Charlize Theron and Seth Rogen as the central pair. Director Jonathan Levine has a history of finding joy in odd places, while the script from Liz Hannah and Dan Sterling is sharp. This is one that deserved a better reception at the box office.

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21. Call Me By Your Name

First real love on one side, unexpected feelings on the other. Luca Guadagnino’s look at love has rightfully been showered with praise and Oscar nominations. Teenager Elio (Timothée Chalamet), juggling at least one girlfriend, finds himself developing a deeper relationship with Oliver (Armie Hammer), who has arrived at the family’s summer home to become his father’s research assistant. Theirs is a carefully drawn connection, shot in sun-dappled, beautiful countryside locales. See it also for Michael Stuhlbarg’s wonderful performance as Elio’s father, acting the hell out of a relatively small role. It’s a peach.

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20. Gone With The Wind

Strap in for an extended romp through the tumult of the American Civil War and beyond via the tale of Scarlett O’Hara, a Southern Belle who’ll do whatever she needs and marry whoever she likes to get what she wants. A true Hollywood epic, with iconic performances from Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable — just prepare yourself for the shockingly crude language (“Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn”) and bum-numbing four-hour runtime.

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19. 10 Things I Hate About You

The film that raised the bar for teenage romantic gestures everywhere: hijack a marching band or don’t even bother. Julia Stiles delivers maximum snark and Heath Ledger is his bad-boy best alongside a cherubic Joseph Gordon-Levitt in this high school Shakespeare adaptation, featuring angsty adolescent poetry, pop-punk perfection on the soundtrack, and the ugliest prom dress ever.

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18. An Affair To Remember

A classic romance with a valuable lesson: look both ways before crossing the road. Cary Grant’s Nickie and Deborah Kerr’s Terry are conflicted lovers who fall for each other on a cruise. There’s one problem – they both have partners back at home to return to. The pair make a pact to meet at the top of the Empire State Building after six months if they still like each other, but Terry misses the reunion after being hit by a car. Like a Green Cross Code video, but with way more emotional impact.

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17. Crazy, Stupid, Love.

It was a love affair for the ages – the world, and Ryan Gosling's abs. Okay, so it also marks the beginning of a double act (Gosling and Emma Stone) that would go on to Oscar-winning musical effect with La La Land. Frank and honest, it's also warm and witty, showcasing Steve Carell's separated dad searching for new love (or lust) even as his daughter (Stone) kicks off her own relationship with the very player (Gosling) he's taking advice from.

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16. Pretty Woman

Julia Roberts became instant rom-com royalty playing Vivian, the hooker with a heart of gold who enters a different kind of transaction with Richard Gere’s uptight businessman Edward. She gets a makeover and a white knight fairytale ending, he discovers true love and a new perspective on relationships. Just don’t think too hard about the sexual politics.

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15. The Apartment

Billy Wilder at the height of his powers guides Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine through a film that explores not just burgeoning attraction, but also loneliness, despair and finding yourself in a world that thinks nothing of you. The result was five Oscars (including Best Picture) from 10 nominations, all of them well-earned. Lemmon is CC Baxter, currying favour with his bosses by letting use his pad as their spot for liaisons. But upon meeting elevator operator Fran Kubelik and saving her life, complicated love blossoms. It’ll win over the hardest heart.

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14. Groundhog Day

Sarcastic weatherman Phil Connors gets stuck in a time loop where he’s forced to become his best self in order to be worthy of wooing co-worker Rita, while also managing to sleep with half of Punxsutawney along the way. Sarcastic weatherman Phil Connors gets stuck in a time loop where he’s forced to become his best self in order to be worthy of wooing co-worker Rita, while also managing to sleep with half of Punxsutawney along the way.

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13. Brokeback Mountain

“I wish I knew how to quit you…” Searing performances from Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal and sensitive direction by Ang Lee (who won an Oscar for his work) combine to create an instant, memorable classic that hinges on tender talk and taboo (for the time it's set, at least) longing. The tale of two cowboys who slowly fall for each other is powerful because it’s so perfectly performed by an impressive ensemble that also includes Michelle Williams and Anne Hathaway.

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12. Breakfast at Tiffany’s

Leaving aside some of the more problematic elements that emerge when the film is viewed with a modern eye, Tiffany’s is powered by Audrey Hepburn’s nuclear-level charm as Holly Golightly, the socialite with an eye for a new neighbour and a dark past. Hepburn has commented about how tricky she found it to play Holly, but you’d never know it from the film, which grabs your attention and rarely lets go.

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11. Amelie

Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s ultra-quirky, hyper-stylised romance couldn’t be more Gallic if it whacked you with a baguette and draped a string of garlic around your neck. For the whimsy-tolerant it’s rich and bold, with a fruity finish in Audrey Tautou’s charming lead performance. For others, it may be Simply Too French.

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10. Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind

With a Charlie Kaufman script and Michel Gondry behind the camera, Eternal Sunshine dispenses with romantic conventions for ponderous ruminations on love, memory, and painful emotion. The non-linear narrative front-loads the break-up scenes, later offering a warmer look at the happy days of the relationship between Joel (Jim Carrey) and Clementine (Kate Winslet), who make the drastic decision to forget each other entirely through a memory-erasing procedure.

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9. Jerry Maguire

Cameron Crowe’s genre mash-up combines the pure joy of falling head over heels in love with the thrills of, erm, sports management deals. It’s more romantic than it sounds, delivering two of cinema’s greatest ever declarations of love within fifteen seconds: Tom Cruise’s “you complete me” dovetailing neatly into Renee Zellweger’s “you had me at hello”.

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8. Before Sunset

Leave it to Richard Linklater to experiment with the format and find something new to say about how love evolves across the years. A follow-up to 1995’s Before Sunrise, it catches up with Ethan Hawke’s Jesse and Julie Delpy’s Celine nine years later for more walking, talking and romance. Written by the cast with their director, it feels like it emerged organically instead of being forced into existence. And it’s warm, witty and real when dealing with affairs of the heart, for good and ill.

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7. Annie Hall

How far Woody Allen’s private life can be extricated from his work is still an ongoing conversation, but viewed in a cultural vacuum (if such a thing is possible or even advisable), Annie Hall stands as one of the finest rom-coms ever made. Diane Keaton is the titular Annie, the laid-back lover of neurotic stand-up comic Alvy. The film avoids emotional grandstanding and instead focuses on the minuscule everyday moments that bring flashes of muted joy and disappointment on a daily basis, topped with fourth-wall-breaking gags and wry asides. It’s unlikely to win new fans, but hard to forget for those who have already seen it.

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6. True Romance

That title’s not ironic — underneath the cocaine, the murders, and Gary Oldman’s dreadlocked Drexl, Tony Scott’s Tarantino-penned crime saga has a raw, beating heart in Christian Slater and Patricia Arquette’s ride-or-die lovers. The film that changed the meaning of ‘three little words’ from “I love you” to “you’re so cool… you’re so cool… you’re so cool…”

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5. The Princess Bride

Rob Reiner’s cult classic flings sickly fairytale tropes off the Cliffs of Insanity on its way to happily ever after. The swashbuckling romance between Princess Buttercup and her faithful farmhand-turned-pirate Westley is so witty, feisty, and engaging that even 10 year-old boys don’t mind the kissing bit. Relationship goals: find a partner that you’d hurl yourself down the world’s longest hill for.

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4. Four Weddings and a Funeral

In one fell swoop Richard Curtis made the jump from Blackadder to the big-screen, propelled Hugh Grant and Mike Newell’s careers, and defined a whole new era of British rom-coms. Four Weddings and a Funeral delivers on the bittersweet promise of its title, balancing foul-mouthed dialogue with chocolate box London locales, all topped off with a rain-soaked feel-good finale.

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3. Brief Encounter

With its ‘a stable husband is better than a passionate lover’ message (hey, it was the 1940s), Brief Encounter is both achingly romantic and poignantly melancholic. Laura and Alec’s first grit-eyed conversation on the train platform is perhaps the original meet-cute, but the duo’s profound connection faces scrutiny from the social mores of the era. The end of the affair is enough to leave you with more than just a speck of dust in your eye.

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2. Casablanca

Humphrey Bogart. Ingrid Bergman. One iconic gin joint. Set against the backdrop of World War II, the story of emotionally bruised bar owner Rick and the return of Ilsa, the old flame who left him emotionally distant, is univeraslly regarded as one of the all-time greats. Its central love story is bittersweet, with a sacrificial pay-off that only bolsters its emotional impact. When you’ve seen it once, you’ll be desperate to play it again.

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1. When Harry Met Sally

It can be hard to find something new to say about Rob Reiner and Nora Ephron’s romantic classic, because it has topped lists and been so praised in the past. How it hits you in both the heart and the funny bone is just part of why this one works, putting together Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal’s initially unlikely lovers. There are the endlessly quotable exchanges, Carrie Fisher stealing scenes like she’s wearing a mask and a striped jumper and the sort of lasting impact that so many movies in the genre have failed to match before or since.

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