Let the Valentine’s Day festivities begin…
Whether you’re having a romantic February fourteenth with your significant other or you and your friends simply need a mid-week break, these fourteen movies will make you happy, sad, and a variety of other Valentine’s Day-appropriate emotions. So grab some heart-shaped sweets, dim the lights, and watch a movie to celebrate this chocolaty holiday that we all need in the throes of Ohio winter.
1. Chocolat
Though technically set during lent, this is a perfect Valentine’s Day movie for one reason. Chocolate. Think Footloose set in France, but instead of bringing dance to a dreary, repressed town, the protagonist brings chocolate. And what is sexier than chocolate? Well, maybe rugged, nomad Johnny Depp. But luckily, you get both from this movie.
2. Tangled
An endearing Disney love story, Tangled has a perfect combo of romance and girl power. This is a Disney movie you can watch on Valentine’s Day without quietly (or perhaps very loudly) griping about the unequal and chauvinistic relationship between the prince and princess. Plus, music by Alan Menken is sure to provide a catchy love song or two.
Though I would love to put the four-hour-long BBC version on this list, I realize that in the fourth week of the semester, time may not allow it. The 2005 release of Pride and Prejudice is shorter and still a beautiful adaptation of Jane Austen’s classic romance. As Kenyon English nerds, we all dream of Mr. Darcy buying us flowers on February fourteenth, but pretending we’re Kiera Knightly as Elizabeth Bennet will just have to do.
4. Sabrina
This movie starring Audrey Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart, and William Holden is a Cinderella story of the fifties. The daughter of a rich family’s chauffer, Sabrina has always been invisible to (and obnoxiously in love with) David. After coming back from Paris with newly found confidence and a new look, however, things change. Audrey Hepburn wears beautiful ball gowns, teaches Bogart to say, “My sister has a yellow pencil” in French, and in general charms the bejeezus out of everyone. What else can you ask for in a movie?
5. The Notebook
First of all, Ryan Gosling. Second of all, Rachel McAdams. Third of all, Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams in the 1940s.
6. Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
A love story about diversity and overcoming odds, this movie was groundbreaking when released in the sixties. When a well-off, white young woman brings her African American fiancée home to meet her parents, their reaction is not as positive as she had hoped after her liberal, accepting upbringing. Neither set of parents is happy about the pending inter-racial marriage of their children, fearing the prejudice that their child will have to face. The combination of Sidney Poitier, Katherine Hepburn, and Spencer Tracy makes it both funny and sincere. But this movie poignantly expresses love that transcends both generations and race.
If you want a classic boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back plotline, then this is not your Valentines Day movie. For those of you who are open to change, however, what is more romantic than Paris? Oh, right. Paris in the twenties with literary characters, sparkly lights, amazing fashion, and the Charleston. The opening scene (five minutes of video of Paris set to enchanting music) is more romantic than any Nicholas Sparks movie.
8. Casablanca
Action. Sacrifice. Love. This movie has it all. If you’ve never seen Casablanca… feel the shame. But now is the perfect time to check it off your list (or re-watch it for the tenth time), as it has one of the best and most emotionally complicated love triangles of all time. It is also a movie that your guy will truly enjoy and will not gag through. So don’t make him watch Sweet Home Alabama again. Watch this movie, and you’ll always have Casablanca.
9. The Parent Trap
The movie of our childhood, The Parent Trap may not be what you think of as a romantic movie. But besides remembering every line in the entire movie, all us nineties girls remember hoping along with Annie and Halle for their scheme to work. We remember sighing and tearing up when it finally does, with the beautiful mom falling into the cool dad’s arms and dancing to Natalie Cole’s “This Will Be an Everlasting Love” at their wedding. It’s enough to make us see past the fact that these parents gave up one of their kids to avoid ever having to see each other. That’s what you call a mature relationship.
10. Bringing Up Baby
If you’re in the mood for a classic rom-com, emphasis on the com, this is for you. The slapstick genius of Katherine Hepburn and Carey Grant is not to be rivaled, and the two of them falling in love in the midst of a leopard-centric crisis makes this Valentines Day choice all the better. Fair warning: “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love” will be in your head until March.
11. Up
Not surprisingly, Disney-Pixar tells a heart-warming, tear-provoking love story in ten minutes. Painted mailboxes, adventure plans, and exotic birds make Carl and Ellie’s life-long love one of the best in Disney history. But this movie has more than romantic love: it will make your heart melt with the love for family, friends, and happy little dogs, too.
12. Moulin Rouge
This musical tragedy is full of catchy songs, lots of laughs, and even more tears. And let’s be honest, that’s Valentines Day in a nutshell. If you want a feel-good romance to watch with your super special someone, skip it. If you want to wallow in self-pity with a pint of ice cream from the bookstore while your roomie is out with her special someone, you’ve found your movie.
Yet another Humphrey Bogart film. Despite his badassery, he’s got an ooey gooey heart just like the rest of us. Loosely based on the book by Ernest Hemmingway, To Have and Have Not is set in Martinique after the fall of France in 1940. Though a great movie on its own, it really made our list because Bogart pairs with sassy, sexy Lauren Bacall, his wife in real life. Oh, the chemistry.
14. Valentine’s Day
I had to. This is reserved for only those of you who need a heavy dose of Valentine’s Day cheese with no filter. Do not go into it expecting an excellent movie. Expect a lot of pretty faces and a lot of pink. Which is really sometimes all you need on February fourteenth.
Honorable Mention: The Hall and Oates scene from 500 Days of Summer. The movie may not make this list, but this scene sure as hell does.