87 Best Movies to Watch With Crush (Page 6)

An innocent-fun movie, Always Be My Maybe is a lovely thing to turn your brain off to. Sasha and Marcus are high-school best friends who dated briefly and went their separate ways. 16 years later, they meet again - Sasha is a famous chef, and Marcus is still living with his dad.

What really makes this movie is the writing from Ali Wong and Randall Park, who also play the two leads. The dialogue is sharp, believable and smart - going as far as covering themes of gender and parenting. But also, because a rom-com about two Asians from San Francisco is not exactly a common occurrence, the characters are fresh, the jokes are fresh - everything is fresh.

Watch out for the character who plays Marcus' dad, he plays the character of an overly honest Korean dad perfectly. And also watch out for Keanu Reeves, he plays a crazy version of himself!

Genre: Comedy, Romance

Actor: Adam Farnsworth-Lautsch, Ali Wong, Ashley Liao, Brian Cook, Byron Noble, Casey Wilson, Charlyne Yi, Chris Hlozek, Corey Seaver, Daniel Dae Kim, Eddie Flake, Ellen Ewusie, Emerson Min, Emilio Merritt, Jackson Geach, Jagen Johnson, James Saito, Jason Canela, JayR Tinaco, Johnny Walkr Jr., Karan Soni, Karen Holness, Keanu Reeves, Kenan Zeigler-Sungur, Kipp Glass, Latonya Williams, Maddie Dixon-Poirier, Marcella Bragio, Marco Soriano, Michelle Buteau, Miya Cech, Neil Webb, Nevin Burkholder, Oliver Rice, Omar Khan, Panta Mosleh, Peggy Lu, Peter New, Randall Park, Raymond Ma, Sean Amsing, Simon Chin, Sonia Beeksma, Steven E. Rudy, Susan Park, Tana Yu, Tyler McConachie, Vivian Bang, Xiao Qing Li, Yaroslav Poverlo

Director: Nahnatchka Khan

Rating: PG-13

One day, Filipino romances will wean themselves away from the tropes that keep their stories circling back to the same conclusions, undermining the bold narrative ideas on which that they establish themselves. Nothing Like Paris still doesn't break free, but its commitment to a more serious, modern view of romance set against the loneliness of migration is surprising given director Sigrid Andrea Bernardo's previous collaboration with her lead actors (the inadvertently creepy I See You, set in Japan). Here, the possibility of romance built on little more than one's shared nationality and language is explored with real maturity, through two performers who prove that subtlety will always leave more room for complex emotion than ugly crying and cutesy, empty gestures.

Genre: Drama, Romance

Actor: Alessandra de Rossi, Dolly de Leon, Empoy Marquez, Jean-Marc Noirot-Cosson

Director: Sigrid Andrea Bernardo

 As glad as I am to see a film celebrating the complex joys of interracial love and debunking the stigma of arranged marriages, I can’t help but wonder how and why a film about love got to be so dry and passionless. Is dating really this painfully awkward? Is marriage really this burdensome? Realistically, yes, but when you’re trying to make a point about true love supposedly trumping it all, including cultural differences and age-old traditions, then you should at least make it seem like the winner. The movie tries to have its cake and eat it too by serving us heaps of realism and fantasy on one plate, failing to understand that you only have to pick one to be palatable. “Love Contractually” is the title of Zoe’s documentary, but it’s also the name this movie should’ve gone with, seeing as how everyone acts like they’re obligated to be here. 

Genre: Comedy, Romance

Actor: Alexander Owen, Alice Orr-Ewing, Asim Chaudhry, Ben Ashenden, Emma Thompson, Haqi Ali, Jamal Andreas, Jeff Mirza, Lily James, Michael Marcus, Mim Shaikh, Munir Khairdin, Nikkita Chadha, Nosheen Phoenix, Oliver Chris, Peter Sandys-Clarke, Ravi Aujla, Sajal Ali, Shabana Azmi, Shaheen Khan, Shazad Latif, Sindhu Vee, Taj Atwal, Wasim Zakir

Director: Shekhar Kapur

Rating: PG-13

Two people with different thoughts on love discover a common ground: they’re both anti-romantics. Realizing they got off on the wrong foot, they spend more time with each other and bond over realistic ideas of modern love. At one point, Maria (Rosalie Thomass) and Karl (Laurence Rupp) even diss romantic comedies for their cheesy music and naive understanding of fate and destiny. Their conversations are engaging and thoughtful, even and especially when they oppose one another. But just when you think you’re watching something smart and novel, Maria and Karl fall into the same implausible trappings they claim to hate. Suddenly, the film turns soft and transforms into the romantic comedy it once criticized. If only it had pushed into anti-romance territory even further and allowed Maria and Karl to truly hash out their differences, thorns and tension and all, then this could have been a truly interesting romantic film. Instead, it’s a standard romantic comedy that’s worse off for pretending to be above the genre, even though it’s really not.

Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance

Actor: Arash Marandi, Charleen Deetz, Cora Trube, Denise M'Baye, Jakob Schreier, Jerry Hoffmann, Laurence Rupp, Margarethe Tiesel, Maria Hofstätter, Özgür Karadeniz, Paula Schramm, Rosalie Thomass

Director: Shirel Peleg

Rating: PG-13

Despite the fact that this isn't the light fantasy romcom it seems to present itself as at the onset, Paging Mr. Darcy nevertheless becomes a breezy, likable little TV movie because it allows its main characters to be adult human beings. The story is still mostly fluff that ends far too abruptly, but for the most part, watching these two walk around and flirt from the very beginning makes for pleasant viewing. There isn't any pressure placed on these people to fabricate some sort of will-they-won't-they dynamic or to act accordingly to Jane Austen's work, and the result is a romance that feels so much simpler and so much more authentic than a Hallmark movie probably deserves.

Genre: Comedy, Romance, TV Movie

Actor: Benjamin Ayres, Carolyn Scott, David Pinard, David Rosser, Jinny Wong, Lillian Doucet-Roche, Mallory Jansen, Steven Vlahos, Will Kemp

Director: Peter Wellington

Rating: G

Just in time for Halloween, Netflix has shelled out for a new, high production value doc about demonic possession. It has all the right ingredients: a true story (that of Arne Cheyenne Johnson, also known as the "Devil Made Me Do It" case of 1981), some convincing re-enactments, the air of exclusivity (use of real archives), but it still feels like a let-down to the true horror buffs who'd tune in expecting something fresh. After all, Netflix has been in the game for a while and it's not a good look to settle for something as mediocre. For The Devil on Trial, it seems like the execs have just upped the budget on a regular cable-TV-haunted-house after hours special and then patted themselves on the back. Even the interviews featured are full of cliches, which strips down the horrifying potential of authenticity.

Genre: Documentary

Actor: Arne Cheyenne Johnson, Tony Spera, Victor Serfaty

Director: Chris Holt

Rating: R

Beat for beat, word for word, Love is in the Air moves just like any other romantic comedy. Within that genre, it slots easily into the category of romcoms that follow a city guy who falls in love with a country girl, eventually learning and preferring the ways of small-town living. But Love in Air is even more improbable than usual because of how eerily perfect the two leads are. Goodrem, in particular, is always manicured to perfection, which makes her role as a down-to-earth no-nonsense go-getter very hard to believe. Still, the movie isn’t entirely unwatchable. There are pockets of humor to be found, and the stunning visuals almost make it worth the watch. Almost.  

Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance

Actor: Craig Walker, Delta Goodrem, Hugh Parker, Joshua Sasse, Mia Grunwald, Roy Billing, Simon McLachlan, Steph Tisdell

Director: Adrian Powers

Rating: PG-13

In a time where the Metaverse feels more and more a looming presence, hoping to crown our complex realities with its utopian promise, it's only natural to expect a film set precisely there. Director L.E. Staiman took a chance with Love Virtually, but his attempt to make a zany, absurdist rom-com (riffing off the title of your aunt's annual Christmas rewatch) simply fails. The premise sees a few couples on the brink of breaking up reconnect with the help of VR headsets, challenging each other's commitment, or cheating with each other (without knowing it of course). A rather funny gambit gets sucked into a vortex of dullness when the characters speak, their dialogues irksome to the point of second-hand embarrassment. Instead of exploring the possibilities of VR relations through an ironic lens, the film seems to not even care enough to look for the genuine comedic potential of the Metaverse as a concept-turned-space. Even the three separate references to Timothée Chalamet don't make a difference to how surprisingly retrograde and somehow banal all of this feels.

Genre: Comedy, Romance

Actor: Adam Ray, Cheri Oteri, Danielle Krivak, Henry Dittman, Nikki Alexis Howard, Paul F. Tompkins, Peter Gilroy, Ryan O'Flanagan, Stephen Tobolowsky, Tom Virtue, Vincent Washington

Director: L.E. Staiman

Five Blind Dates is a squeaky clean, hopelessly boring film pretending to be a raunchy romcom. Despite Lia (Shuang Hu) going on five (or four, really) dates, she doesn’t find real chemistry with any one of them. There’s no heat, no passion, no inane fun to be had, or reckless experimentation. It’s clear that what she’s after isn’t really love but a partner who accepts her traditional whims, which I guess counts as a happy ending if this were airing on Hallmark or any other wholesome TV channel. But it isn’t, and instead of embracing its true form—that is, family drama—it instead postures as a modern and exciting romcom, even though it contains zero spice. To be fair, the film has its funny moments, and I do think the first date’s premise, while played for laughs, has the potential to spark an interesting discussion about our generation’s willingness to sacrifice intimacy for financial security. But the film doesn’t really go there, nor anywhere, and remains as stale and safe as can be.

Genre: Comedy, Romance

Actor: Desmond Chiam, Ilai Swindells, Jon Prasida, Rob Collins, Shuang Hu, Tzi Ma, Yoson An

Director: Shawn Seet

The film takes us into the mind of a performative teenager trying to convince us, or an imaginary cameraman, of his coolness and wisdom. The second-person device may evoke teen comedy series from the 2000s (at best), but it is incredibly disorienting in this 100-minute movie. It is a slog of straightforward punchlines and tired cliches, which picks up a little too late in the final act where the central idea finally reveals itself: the harder you try to maintain control, the more easily it slips away. Similarly, the less brain power you use for this film, the better it gets.

Genre: Comedy, Romance

Actor: Charithra Chandran, Charles Camrose, Daisy Jelley, Dhanushka Anson, Guz Khan, Kunal Nayyar, Lucy Punch, Madeline Holliday, Maisie Peters, Nick Frost, Sebastian Croft, Tanner Buchanan, Tim Downie

Director: Alex Pillai