Whether you’re spending this Valentine’s Day home alone, out on the town, with friends, with your significant other, or long distance from your partner, there’s nothing that says Valentine’s Day like watching a good rom com and eating chocolate covered strawberries in bed.
This Valentine’s Day weekend, carve out some time for yourself to get comfy, put on a face mask, grab some chocolate, and cuddle up to watch one of these incredible romantic movies. You deserve it.
How To Lose a Guy in 10 Days
This iconic 2003 film stars Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey as advice columnist, Andie Anderson, and advertising executive, Ben Berry — two ambitious people with their own agendas. Andie is determined to finish her article on how to get a guy to dump you in ten days, exposing where women go wrong in relationships. Meanwhile, overconfident Ben needs to make a woman fall in love with him in ten days in order to win a big campaign.
What could go wrong when these two set their sights on one another? This movie is funny, romantic, and perfect for a cozy night in.
The Proposal
This is hands down by all-time favorite rom com. Ryan Reynolds, Sandra Bullock, the late great Betty White, and so many more incredible cast members star in this hilarious film.
When the intimidating, ambitious, and equally-respected-as-she-is-hated book editor Margaret Tate faces deportation to Canada (meaning the loss of her job), she decides to force her assistant, Andrew Paxton, to marry her. However, when the “engaged” couple visits Andrew’s eccentric family, their dynamic starts to change.
This movie is so worth the watch — I promise you’ll love it.
Sweet Home Alabama
Reese Witherspoon plays Melanie, a New York fashion designer from Alabama who thought she left her life behind her when she moved up north and lost the accent, but when she ends up engaged to her dream man, her past comes back to haunt her. She has to go back home for the first time in seven years to confront her high school sweetheart who still won’t sign their divorce papers, forcing her to confront her past and remember her rowdy childhood in the deep South.
This movie is a must-see and lives happily on my list of comfort movies to watch on a bad day. It’s fun, warmhearted, and a perfect Valentine’s Day flick.
Crazy Rich Asians
One word: perfection. The characters? Incredible. The scenery? Absolutely gorgeous. That wedding? A literal dream. The OUTFITS? Put the Met Gala to shame. The romance in this movie is absolutely top notch. If you haven’t gotten a chance to watch this yet, it’s the perfect modern day romance.
Letters to Juliet
Any movie that features Amanda Seyfried playing a character named Sophie set in Europe never disappoints. When Sophie visits Verona, Italy, she comes across a wall where heartbroken women leave letters to Shakespeare’s Juliet, which are responded to by a group of romantic women working for the Italian government.
Sophie discovers a letter hidden behind a brick from 1957, and decides to write back to the now-elderly author, Claire, encouraging her to go after her true love. Claire takes her advice and decides, decades later, to go after her true love with her cynical grandson and Sophie by her side.
The scenery in this movie is absolutely stunning, and the plot is perfect Valentine’s Day material.
10 Things I Hate About You
This 90’s classic starring Julia Stiles and Heath Ledger is the perfect high school rom com, featuring the edgy, abrasive teen Kat Stratford whose popular, bubbly younger sister Bianca isn’t allowed to date until she does. While Kat doesn’t seem all that interested in anyone, Bianca is, and there’s quite a few people invested in making sure that Kat Stratford gets a boyfriend, any boyfriend. In comes the mysterious, equally abrasive Patrick Verona, paid to convince Kat to go out with him.
This movie is funny, upbeat, and sarcastic, but still meets all the requirements of a great rom com.
Set It Up
This is a relatively new Netflix original, but it quickly found a place in my heart. Zoey Deutch and Glen Powell star as underpaid and overworked assistants for workaholic bosses Lucy Liu and Taye Diggs. They decide to work together to get their bosses off their backs by, you guessed it, setting them up. In the process, the two become best friends and maybe something more.
Love, Simon
Love, Simon is also a relatively new movie, but it truly is the perfect rom com for the modern age. Simon is a closeted gay high schooler falling in love with an anonymous classmate online, all while struggling to hide who he really is from his friends, his family, and his school.
Each character in this movie is so lovable and relatable, from Simon’s parents to his friends to “Blue”. This one absolutely needs to be seen by as many people as possible.
Music and Lyrics
Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore play a has-been musician and an awkward writer who come together to write a song for pop sensation Cora Corman in just a few days. This movie is funny, sweet, and the perfect Valentine’s Day film to celebrate love and second chances.
Isn’t It Romantic
This is the perfect movie for anyone who loves making fun of rom coms. This 2019 movie follows an architect who gets knocked out in the subway and wakes up in her worst nightmare: a romantic comedy where nobody can curse, sex scenes are skipped over to waking up the next day, tripping over your own feet is ‘quirky and cute,’ hair is perfect all the time, gay best friends don’t have jobs and only live for fashion montages, apartments are always perfectly clean, and sometimes things just have to be in slo-mo.
Starring Rebel Wilson, Liam Hemsworth, Adam Devine, and Priyanka Chopra, this movie is the perfect amount of funny and sweet. It plays on all the classic tropes from Pretty Woman, 13 Going on 30, Enchanted, When Harry Met Sally, Jerry Maguire and My Best Friend’s Wedding in such an upbeat, creative way. This movie is a fun time and I highly recommend it.
Honorable mentions:
The Notebook, Me Before You, When We First Met, Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates, Just Go With It, 13 Going on 30, Little Italy, The Holiday, Shakespeare in Love, Titanic, Love Actually, Made of Honor, The Fault in Our Stars, Mamma Mia!, Miss Congeniality and Love, Rosie