Romance-comedy movies had their peak time from the late 1980s to the early 2000s. Modern movies of the same genre have become few and far between, with the most notable and recent one being Anyone but You that came out in 2023.
The lack of modern rom-coms has left teens and young adults without a flow of films leading them through the triumphs and failures of meeting and interacting with other people, which in a technology-heavy world is arguably more needed. This generation needs rom-coms and not just re-watches of old films. These new movies are needed because the new generations need stories with actors and plot points applicable to the modern day.
That being said, some of the traditional rom coms promote classic gestures that can still be adored today, for example the boombox over the head scene as seen in Say Anything, depicting how impactful grand gestures can be.
Another gesture seen in romance-comedy movies is the act of forgiveness, which is often overlooked in real life. For example, in the film How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, a mutual forgiveness between the characters leads to the development of the true relationship, which parallels the modern day, in which mistakes and mess ups call for forgiveness for people to grow closer together.
The modern world’s standards are unrealistic expectations set by celebrities dominating social media, depicting every interaction as something perfect. Past rom coms aimed to show the beauty in imperfection and the real world. For example, the movie Because I Said So has characters meeting through an accidental insult of one man’s career, and the static of her dress resulting in an embarrassing meet with another. This is what is known as a meet cute.
Although there is a dearth of modern rom coms, one comes along every so often to give us lessons: communication and awkwardness. A miscommunication between people is often the beginning of romance comedies, which is repeatedly a very deliberate and intentional choice. So often society takes whatever is said by one person as absolute fact, and any slip-up past that is taken too seriously.
Romance comedies with the miscommunication trope aim to show viewers that mistakes and mixes happen and are not always the death of a relationship as some may think. The film While You Were Sleeping follows a girl mistaken as being the fiancée of a man, which without happening, would have prevented the main character from meeting her love interest. Without this perspective of communication being a constant area of practice, doors are being shut in unknown places amongst young adults today.
As for awkwardness, particularly in tweens and teens, the emotion has become stigmatized for being “embarrassing”, and while that may be true, rom coms worked to destigmatize awkwardness and the embarrassment that comes with that all together. In the trilogy of The Kissing Booth movies, awkward teenage scenarios are faced time and time again for teenagers to be able to relate to.
From an accidental skirt mishap to an accidental school-intercom confession, the characters are repeatedly put through embarrassing situations that people specifically from the ages of 12-18 can relate to. Not to say that rom coms are only meant for that demographic, as different rom coms can stretch far and wide with targeted age demographics. This genre of films promotes both awkwardnesses, as well as positive endings that people can resonate with and walk out of the movie theaters feeling happy and ready to concur what is the dating world.
These lessons are so impactful they are even referenced in non-rom-com productions. For example, the character Ted from the AppleTV show Ted Lasso discusses the principle of “rom communism”, a life principle that everything will turn out okay, just like in those films, even if it isn’t the way you anticipated or wanted it to turn out. This life principle, if applied today, could help thousands of people all across the globe with not only romance, but communication amongst friends and family, give a somewhat reasonable depiction with realistic expectations, and help people become just a little bit better than they were the day before.
