The 50 Most Romantic Movies of All Time #5
41. A Matter of Life and Death (1946):
Not even the Great Beyond will keep British RAF pilot David Niven from radio operator Kim Hunter; when you've finally met your true love as you're bailing out of a plane, death is simply a speed bump. Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's fantasy lets a celestial courtroom decide their fate. Take a guess whether the duo's romance wins out.
42. Now, Voyager (1942):
The incomparable Bette Davis goes from dowdy to hottie in this consummate Hollywood soaper. She's the introverted Charlotte Vale, who cuts ties with her domineering mother and falls in love with a handsome gent. Trouble is, he's married. Intoxicating twists and turns culminate with one of the greatest final lines in cinema. We're not spoiling it.
43. Sideways (2004):
Love is often about second chances: Alexander Payne's middle-age comedy has a beauty of a flirtation in Paul Giamatti's courtship of the never-so-radiant Virginia Madsen. But isn't the movie bromantic, too? An egocentric Thomas Haden Church, proud yet wounded, nearly steals the show.
44. Love Affair (1939):
Man meets woman. They fall in love. They part ways, promising to reunite six months later. Fate intervenes. How many movie romances have been influenced by Leo McCarey's classic? There'd certainly be no Sleepless in Seattle without it. Even McCarey himself remade the film as An Affair to Remember. But the original is still the best.
45. Summertime (1955)
Ah, Venice—the perfect place for spinster Katharine Hepburn to fall head over heels for a local merchant. David Lean's other extravagant ode to transient love (see also our No. 10) is filled with colorful scenery and woozy innuendos—the pair's first kiss ignites literal fireworks—that make your heart explode.
46 Ninotchka (1939):
"Garbo laughs!" promised posters for this immortal romantic comedy (a tagline riffing on the famous one for her first talkie, Anna Christie: "Garbo speaks!"). But the studio heads might just as well have declared "Garbo melts!"—as in, thaws into a human being. Playing this film's Soviet diplomat warming to Paris and Melvyn Douglas, she's a bonfire.
47. Voyage in Italy (1954):
Roberto Rossellini's heartbreaker follows an unhappily married European couple (Ingrid Bergman and George Sanders) as they visit Naples on family business. Emotions run high and quarrels are constant. Yet the breathtaking Italian landscapes act as a kind of cosmic counterpoint—perhaps their union is more solid than they realize.
48. Happy Together (1997):
It's obvious that Tony Leung and Leslie Cheung's relationship is on the skids, and that tooling through Argentina isn't going to fix a thing. But Wong Kar-wai's melancholic gay drama turns the duo's disintegration into one sad, sexy long goodbye. That peppy title pop song never sounded so perversely ironic.
49. Starman (1984):
Long before winning his Oscar, Jeff Bridges managed to be both out-of-this-world strange and undeniably lovable (particularly to widowed earthling Karen Allen) in this affecting between-the-sheets version of E.T.The unlikely director was horror master John Carpenter, proving capable of far more than bloodletting.
50. Certified Copy (2010):
Yes, the movie came out just a month ago, but we're in the presence of greatness. A sun-dappled Tuscan village is the dreamy setting for Abbas Kiarostami's profound and playful conversation piece. What begins as an intellectual game—two strangers pretending to be married—transforms into emotional territory that leaves you breathless....
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