You'll Laugh, You'll Cry, You'll Wish Everyone Involved Was Horribly Maimed: The Romantic Comedies Poll Nominations and Discussion Thread

We've done action movies, horror, comedies - time for that most maligned of cinematic subgenres to have its day. Everything centering around two people in love + comedy joeks is eligible, from Lubitsch to Apatow. We'll keep this thread open for couple weeks and then we'll do the standard voting/ballots thing. Vote for however many you want, I'll figure out some weighted scoring based on what people submit.

SEND YOUR BALLOTS TO: audiobot at yahoo dot com

BALLOTS DUE: August 24th, 5pm PST

is this a poll for "worst" or "best"

what do you think, smartypants?

Are the following eligible:

Shaun of the Dead
The Princess Bride

xp lol i'm serious, w/ the thread title and how maligned the genre is, it was an innocent question

I would imagine whatev you think counts counts. Just concentrate on pre-1950 and you'll be fine.

All the Before crapfests will outpoll the complete works of Mitchell Leisen here, so I doubt I can stand to participate.

the Before crapfests aren't comedy tho right?

my favourite movie of all time is a romantic comedy, btw (That Obscure Object Of Desire)

Shaun of the Dead
The Princess Bride

the latter yes, the former ... uh I know I've seen this movie and yet I have absolutely zero memory of there being a romantic plot in it at all so I'm gonna say no.

Before movies are not eligible, no joeks

you not allowing non-sexual romance then? pegg/frost work that bro dynamic like it's got money hanging on it (which it does)

absolutely zero memory of there being a romantic plot in it at all so I'm gonna say no.

It's quite a major part of it! But you're the boss.

Like the whole film is basically about Shaun getting his girlfriend back.

ah man did i miss the chance to do a "romance" poll? ah well...enjoy debating whether movies are funny enough to qualify!

Bringing Up Baby, btw

^if this isn't top 3 you all fucking suck

it's a Zom-Rom-Com iirc. I wouldn't vote for it, but it definitely counts

Not going to vote in this at all (lack of familiarity - will be watching the results), but I would like to pile on outis for disqualifying Shawn of the Dead.

no one should tell other people what movies can or cannot make them laugh and make them cry

also using comedy as a weapon to keep out the movies that spend more time on feels than pratfalls for shame

ok fine Shaun of the Dead counts what do I care. movie made v little impression on me.

non-sexual romance

idk what this is, or whether or not its a common enough subject to warrant inclusion

Do the Thin Man movies count as romcoms, you think? I think so. No?

i feel pratfalls

the problem is i wd probably like to vote for cukor's Holiday but haven't seen it in maybe 15 years. so now i have to watch it in the next 12 days, along w/ 20 other titles i will think of.

Nick and Nora are married, which kills romance QED

(j/k)

If you haven't seen this already, you probably can't--but you should.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsNTe9vdTGE

just let peoples hearts want what they want, and have faith in a happy ending poll-wise - telling people they're wrong about what's a romantic comedy feels like something the guy left seething at the altar does

lotta laugh lines in before sunrise imo

I don't have much interest in being genre police/bad guy tbh

i'm only submitting a ballot if you promise to let hearts run free, and be jerry orbach at the end of dirty dancing not jerry orbach in the middle of dirty dancing

vote for whatever you want you big baby

nobody puts big baby in a corner!

nominations:

When Harry Met Sally...
The Sure Thing
Easy A
Say Anything...
The Shop Around The Corner
Splash
Roxanne
The Princess Bride
The 40-Year-Old Virgin
Knocked Up
Clueless
Moonstruck
The Thin Man
The Lady Eve
High Fidelity
Four Weddings And A Funeral
Hitch
Arthur
Groundhog Day
Friends With Benefits
Bull Durham
Manhattan Murder Mystery
Unfaithfully Yours
Singles
So I Married An Ax Murderer

Before Sunrise
Before Sunset
Defending Your Life
Pygmalion

well I'll just get these out of the way (some Leisen in there for Morbz)

Midnight
Easy Living
Remember The Night
Ball of Fire
It Happened One Night
His Girl Friday
Bringing Up Baby
My Favorite Wife
The Awful Truth
The Palm Beach Story
My Man Godfrey
Holiday
Twentieth Century
Ninotchka
The Philadelphia Story
The Lady Vanishes
Born Yesterday
It Should Happen To You

The African Queen
Date Night
Up All Night
They Came Together

good list nn

Americas sweethearts.

woops, Up All Night should be All Night Long (Streisand/Hackman)

heh, i seem to remember that whatever romance is in The Lady Vanishes
is there bcz it "has to be"

All Of Me

some of these noms might be pushing it but..

hannah and her sisters
as good as it gets
tootsie
a matter of life and death
flirting
amelie
metropolitan
swingers
manhattan
annie hall
beautiful girls
the tall guy
pretty in pink

The Naked Gun

for this our hill, and these are our beans

the fabulous baker boys
raising arizona

Roman Holiday
Breakfast at Tiffany's
The Graduate
The Heartbreak Kid
Broadcast News
Married to the Mob

ooh Married To The Mob; SO under rated.

Lots of Hitchcock movies could double as rom-coms, so in that spirit:

The 39 Steps
North by Northwest

oh man can't believe i forgot raising arizona and married to the mob yes

wouldn't vote for it now but back when my romantic ideal was a little more toxic i totally would have gone to bat for who's afraid of virginia woolf

true romance

Something Wild's good, but I like Married better--especially on the comedy end of it.

Tried to get my wife to watch Something Wild a year or two ago and lemme tell ya, years of manic pixie dream girls since has not made melanie griffith's character/performance fresher

NxNW is tooootally a romcom yeah

(that sounds sarcastic, it isn't)

hurry up laggards!

But even from the pod of a newbie she's older than the average Manic Pixie Girl. She emits a danger that the Zooeys don't.

the fact that she was hovering around 30 doesn't make the shtick fresher, and you're really overrating the danger emittance in the first act

pssshht, Tuomas won't look at this thread again until Thursday.

nobody's mentioned About Last Night.... which was the first "date movie" i actually watched while on a date

is there a number limit on the ballots?

well the longest ballot so far is Morbz' with 50. I adjusted the scoring/point weighting to accomodate that (which didn't really change the results much) but I'd say that's the upper limit now.

Ballot sent.

nobody's mentioned About Last Night....

when you say "romantic comedy" you're really saying "David Mamet"

I did find Mamet's casting of Al Pacino/Helen Mirren as a couple in "Spector" p funny

now i'm fretting whether Rob Lowe was the Herbert Marshall or Melvyn Douglas of the '80s

16 ballots now. any more last minute contenders besides tuomas?

The David Manners, Morbs.

I would say Cesar Romero, cept that might be Freddie Prinze Jr.

Sent my ballot.

any other stragglers out there...?

allright unless there are any objections I'm gonna close balloting - 17 voters.

that seems like way less ballots than the action and comedies polls I guess ILX just doesn't feel the LUV

or ILM thinks Radiohead has more laffs and romance.

or people didn't wanna fuck with subgenre police

arrest this man

His Meg Ryan hairdo is making me feel ill

the fact that she was hovering around 30 doesn't make the shtick fresher, and you're really overrating the danger emittance in the first act

I'll concede that someone who's endured 500 Days of Summer's Hall & Oates sequence has less patience for this shit, but there's enough going on in SW -- the use of locations, soundtrack, use of non-actors and the supporting cast -- to mitigate The Scent of Manic Pixiness. A large part of what makes the movie work for me is how I never know how I'm supposed to feel about Charlie and Lulu's hookup, Charlie going along with Lulu, Lulu herself. Cuz of all the stuff I mentioned, the ground feels like it's continuously churning. Few Manic Pixie movies even bother.

shit can i still send a ballot? balls.

no, Οὖτις's in charge of the poll.

shit just sent a ballot :/

oh well if it counts it counts, if not .. my own daft fault doh

I'll include it dont worry

ahh you're a good man.

this will probably be at least as bad as the general comedy poll

Jonathan Demme knows nothing abt yr Manic Pixie Shit, and the guy who wrote the script -- w/out looking, im gonna say E Max Frye? and that he never had another credit in the same ballpark? -- was also too old to.

omg, that guy has written the Carell-Tatum wrestling-psycho drama

and it's his first theatrical feature in 14 years

i just sent a way late ballot sorry! looking forward to rollout whether it gets in or not.

Laggards I say!

put them in the iron maiden!

Make 'em watch Maid in Manhattan.

haha

that seems like way less ballots than the action and comedies polls I guess ILX just doesn't feel the LUV

I think some people (like me) might've gotten confused by the title of this thread, because it says "The Romantic Comedies Poll Nominations and Discussion Thread", with no mention of voting, or a deadline. I thought there'd be a separate thread for voting, as is usually the case with ILX ballot polls.

Can send a ballot tonight if that's ok.

new ILX ballot wardens

http://trueclassics.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/great_mcginty.jpg

I thought there'd be a separate thread for voting

yeah well this has never made sense to me (what is there to discuss in a voting thread - that you voted?) and as Romantic Comedies Poll Dictator For Life I have dispensed with this unnecessary step

hurry it up xyzzzzz

If I knew there'd be extra time, I coulda watched some of my choices!

you still can, you just can't change your vote

Sorry btw, can't, actually needed time to remind myself etc etc.

Look forward to the countdown.

you are fired from this thread

VOTING CLOSED

RESULTS TOMORROW

Damn! Didn't realise that the voting phase had even begun. Oh well, interested in the results.

Brief but relevant: http://blogs.indiewire.com/bent/when-harry-met-adam-and-steve-the-problems-in-creating-a-good-queer-rom-com-20140825

oh man, i have seen some painful stinkers in that realm.

I finally saw My Man Godfrey for the first time today and I love it so fucking much. I am ashamed it took me this long to enjoy but will i ever enjoy another movie as much? DOUBTFUL

https://i.makeagif.com/media/9-23-2015/hAf7-p.gif