20 rom-coms that send a terrible message

Down with Love exquisitely spoofs the 1950s sex comedies of Doris Day and Rock Hudson, with Renée Zellweger and Ewan McGregor perfectly slipping into the Day and Hudson-type characters. Zellweger is particularly hilarious as the feminist author Barbara Novak. Unfortunately, the revelation that she built her entire literary career to seduce McGregor’s Catcher Block sends a particularly toxic message. It suggests that even a successful woman really just wants a man and could never possibly be happy with a career, no matter how successful.

Sabrina is widely considered a classic of the romantic comedy genre, and it’s easy to see why. Among other things, it boasts a truly extraordinary cast, including Humphrey Bogart and Audrey Hepburn. However, it has to be said that the relationship between Bogart’s Linus Larraebee and Hepburn’s Sabrina Fairchild does strain credulity. More than that, the whole thing positions Hepburn as almost child-like in her simplicity and desire to be Linus, and it’s a relationship that hasn’t aged particularly well in the seven decades since its release. 

Overboard is, like so many 1980s romantic comedies, problematic in numerous ways, not the least of which is that it essentially involves a man taking advantage of the fact that a woman has amnesia. True, Goldie Hawn’s Joanna is pretty horrible at the beginning, but it’s still vexing to watch Kurt Russell’s Dean lie to her for much of the movie, only to have them ultimately fall in love. It’s hardly the best way to start a relationship, but at least Hawn and Russell have good chemistry together. 

While romantic comedies obviously are not meant to be taken particularly seriously, they still contain a lot of information about what a society expects of couples. There’s much to enjoy about My Best Friend’s Wedding, but everyone in the movie, particularly Julianne and Michael, is ridiculously messy and borderline dysfunctional. Beneath all of the rom-com humor and silliness, there’s a deeply unfortunate message that encourages people to think that acting in unhinged ways is in some way an expression of love rather than of a dysfunctional personality. 

Happiest Season received a lot of praise when it was released for being an LGBTQ+ Christmas rom-com. Unfortunately, it has some pretty terrible ideas about what constitutes a functional relationship. The relationship at the heart of the movie is deeply dysfunctional, with one partner (Harper) making all sorts of demands on the other (Abby). The fact that they end up together suggests that all has been forgiven and that Harper doesn’t have some serious work to do before she’s really ready for a relationship.

The idea of a kid magically transformed into an adult is one that has been used by Hollywood numerous times. While it makes for a lot of whimsy, it also carries some troubling implications. In Big,  for example, Tom Hanks’ Josh Baskin starts the movie as a kid, becomes an adult, and then has a romance with a woman. It’s all played for laughs and fun, but it’s one of those aspects of a 1980s romantic comedy that starts to feel and look a lot creepier when one thinks about it too much.

10 Things I Hate About You is arguably every millennial’s favorite romantic comedy, and it does tap into the enduring appeal of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew. However, it must be said that it also preserves the fundamental message of the play: an independent woman must secretly yearn to fall in love with a man and transition from her father’s control to her boyfriend’s. It’s a message that is frustratingly regressive, and it puts a bit of a damper on the joy and laughter that the film provides.  

Julia Roberts was the queen of the romantic comedy throughout the 1990s and into the 2000s, and she had particularly strong chemistry with Richard Gere. Though Runaway Bride was a tremendous success — at least at the box office — it does tend to send the same sort of messages as any other romantic comedy. Rather than allowing Roberts’ character just to enjoy her identity as a single woman finding herself, it instead forces her with a man who supposedly “gets” her.

Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan make for the perfect rom-com couple, and they have great chemistry together in Sleepless in Seattle. However, while the movie was popular at the time of its release and has remained so, it has to be said that Meg Ryan’s character, Annie Reed, is really a stalker when one thinks about it. The extraordinary lengths to which she goes to meet the man of her dreams might seem quaint and quirky, but outside of the context of a rom-com, they are really quite creepy.

Sweet Home Alabama might be one of the most beloved rom-coms of the 2000s, but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have some pretty terrible messaging. After all, this is a movie that focuses on a woman who essentially throws away a perfectly good relationship — and a very nice guy! — in favor of a man who she should have already divorced and who has real issues with expressing his feelings. As so often, this rom-com encourages women to settle for men who don’t really deserve them.

Henry Golding might be the epitome of a swoony hero in Crazy Rich Asians, but his character, Nick Young, probably isn’t the ideal role model for a romantic hero. Among other things, he doesn’t really do very much to defend his love interest, Rachel, against his family, particularly his mother. Moreover, he lies to her about his family before finally fessing up, which is hardly the best way to begin a relationship that’s supposed to be an enduring one.

Doris Day and Rock Hudson appeared in several romantic comedies throughout the 1950s, and Pillow Talk is arguably their best collaboration. It is, however, an entire movie based on lies and deception, and, ultimately, Hudson’s Brad Allen essentially manhandling Day’s Jan and carrying her through the city streets in her pajamas. It’s funny, of course, but it’s also very much in keeping with the more regressive gender norms and expectations of 1950s America (even if the whole thing is also a little ironic, given Hudson’s homosexuality).

Never Been Kissed is definitely one of those movies that could never be made today. After all, this is a story about a young woman, Josie, who masquerades as a high school student and then falls in love with her teacher, who starts to return her feelings. Though, of course, she’s in her twenties when the film starts, her teacher doesn’t know that, and this casts a bit of a pall over their romance that no amount of rom-com logic can entirely dispel. 

Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan have undeniable chemistry in You’ve Got Mail, but their relationship is deeply troubling. After all, Hanks’ character is not only a corporate bookstore owner determined to run a small bookstore out of business, but he’s also the first to realize that the woman he’s been flirting with online is the owner of the bookstore he’s trying to run out of business. It makes for a cute romantic comedy setup, but the film’s suggestion that lying and deception make for a good start to a relationship is questionable at best.

Grease takes its place in the long line of romantic comedies that essentially argue that women should change themselves in order for the men in their lives to find them desirable. While it’s true that Olivia Newton-John’s Sandy does contain at least more agency than most–and she does seem to have Danny wrapped around her finger–the truth is that she’s the one who seems to change the most, and all in the pursuit of a man. The movie’s music might still be catchy, but its central message about relations between the sexes is quite dated.

It’s no secret that there are many aspects of Sixteen Candles that haven’t aged especially well, the racist caricature being one of them. Just as perniciously, the movie also makes light of the date rapë culture that was such a key part of 1980s American life. While it might be tempting to dismiss this as a product of its time, its subsequent valorization as part of the 1980s canon makes it all the more vital to be aware of the messages it continues to send.

In many ways, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days  is the paradigmatic romantic comedy, telling the story of a man and a woman who each end up seducing the other to prove a point to their respective friends. While it’s undeniably fun and there’s great chemistry between Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey, the movie really does valorize the idea that it’s perfectly acceptable to begin a relationship with dishonesty. The fact that this dysfunctional relationship ends up being validated by the film’s narrative isn’t the best message.

With its blend of Pygmalion and My Fair Lady, it was probably inevitable that She’s All That would end up sending some not-so-great messages to its audience. Its central message boils down to the idea that the supposedly ugly Laney (played by Rachel Leigh Cook) basically has to change everything about herself and conform to traditional beauty standards to be worthy of love. It was a deeply unfortunate message when the film came out in the 1990s, and it has only grown more so in the intervening decades.

Love Actually might be a Christmas classic for many, but it still indulges in more than its fair share of terrible messages. Most notably, it romanticizes the deeply problematic relationship between Hugh Grant’s Prime Minister and  Martine McCutcheon’s Natalie. This romance is always overshadowed by the huge difference in their relative power. When one adds in the relentless fatphobia that is constantly hurled in Natalie’s direction, it’s hard to escape the fact that this movie has some very pernicious messaging.

It’s hard to know just where to start with the film Shallow Hal. The movie is very much a product of the deeply fatphobic 2000s, and its story about a man who falls in love with a 300-pound woman because he believes she’s a thinner, supposedly more beautiful version of herself would never fly today. Though it’s clearly trying to subvert cultural conflations of beauty with thinness, it ultimately reinforces the very negative and fatphobic sentiments that it seems to be criticizing.