‘For culture and society’ – Why we need to fall in love with rom-coms again

Rom-coms have always mattered; Hollywood just failed to treat them right

Rom-coms have long been a source of comfort for me, but it's a genre that both society and Hollywood have turned their backs on in recent years, and it's such a waste. The rom-com genre is one of the very few that actually lifts cinema-goers up. They give us hope, they help us believe that there is some good in the world, and they are full of escapism, and escapism is something we desperately need in our lives right now.

We're in the era of doomscrolling and are overwhelmed by a never-ending stream of bad news on an hourly basis. It's not normal to consume as much negativity as we do, and that's why going to the cinema is something that can help us. It isn't going to mend everything, but it allows you to step away from your phone, to switch off from reality, albeit for 90 minutes, and to live in another story.

They may not be as popular as they were in the golden era of rom-coms when Meg Ryan graced cinema screens, and Bridget Jones was the leading lady we all adored, but there's still a place for rom-coms in our world; we just need to give them the love they deserve.

"There is just a kind of weird alchemy that makes them a bit magic."

Hollywood failed to treat rom-coms with the same care they gave superhero franchises, but filmmakers like Alicia MacDonald and authors like Emily Henry are giving the genre the reputation it has rightfully deserved all along.

In an interview with Her.ie, Finding Emily director, Alicia MacDonald explained why people love rom-coms so much.

"The characters feel like real people and not just characters in a movie, and that was what I was really interested in as well. I think there's a real soulful element to rom-coms that really stands out. There's chemistry between the leads. There's always a real sort of style and a sense of place to them all as well. But there is a kind of weird alchemy that makes them a bit magic."

She continued, "You can't necessarily put your finger on why they're so great, but it's a sort of combination of lots of different factors."

MacDonald agreed that the genre was neglected for some time, with Hollywood forgetting about the magic of rom-coms and opting to churn out formulaic chick-flicks that didn't strike the same chord with audiences. It was lazy and failed to capture the same magic of classics made by Nora Ephron and Nancy Meyers.

"There was the glorious decade between 1989, with When Harry Met Sally, and 2001, with Bridget, and all the brilliant movies in between. But then I feel like they may have gotten a little formulaic or a little generic story-wise.

"But now hopefully they are coming back 'cause they're really important films, I think, for culture, for society to have something hopeful and positive, because falling in love with someone or just like figuring out that you have an affection for someone is really important. We're social creatures."

Movies like Finding Emily will revive the genre in the right way because of MacDonald and her team. They're not just painting by numbers; they're treating this genre with the care, respect, and dignity it deserves.

"We're going to go authentic. We're going to go real. The music is going to be great. It's going to have a real sense of place. I think they've got this terrible rep for being throwaway films or glossy or shiny, or they take their audience for granted. But that was part of a really fun part of the challenge for me, like how are we going to make a good one?"

And the Finding Emily team did that and then some. The charming and hopeful English film is a reminder that the rom-com genre never really died. We just needed to find the right filmmakers who cared enough to make good rom-coms again.

Finding Emily is in cinemas now.