ARTS & CULTURE
in defense of rom-coms By Audrey Ledbetter
P
icture this: on your tiny little laptop screen, two strangers meet and engage in some flirty (often antagonistic) banter. By some happenstance, they are forced to remain in each other’s lives: a new job turns them into begrudging coworkers, a fake relationship keeps someone’s parents from commenting on their devastating singlehood, etc. They become great friends. Finally they get together, or come close, but then, for lack of better words, shit hits the fan: someone messes up or fate intervenes with a misunderstanding. Just when it seems like it might not work out, someone apologizes with a sincere or grand gesture, and the film ends as the camera zooms out on a dramatic kiss. This thrillingly predictable formula is at the heart of romantic comedies (from now on referred to by the world’s greatest abbreviation, rom-coms). Rom-coms tend to garner no critical acclaim and frequently get called “cheesy,” “predictable,” or “chick flicks,” as if these labels are where good movies go to die. But in them we find both the most delectable escapism and the most hopeful messages about love. For these two qualities to shine, however, the writing and the journey between each predictable milestone matters; the chemistry and romance must be believable. As much as rom-coms get a bad rap for simply offering happy endings without 10 TUFTS OBSERVER FEBRUARY 14, 2022
any other substance, the best ones offer a compelling journey that makes the viewer feel invested. Izzy Essman is a senior writing her thesis on Nora Ephron, the American journalist and screenwriter who wrote the 1989 rom-com classic When Harry Met Sally. In her paper, Essman argues that “modern rom-coms need Nora Ephron because she [knows] how to tell a story and not just give you an ending that would make you happy.” In the best rom-coms, the real joy is not the happy ending, but the road towards it. Essman continued, “When Harry Met Sally is a 13 year journey of two annoying people who find out who they’re going to be and then find out that a person they thought they hated is the person who they want to spend their lives with. It’s funny, it’s interesting, it’s weird, and it’s really well written.” The movie follows the pair from when they first meet and spend an entire drive from Chicago to New York talking and finding out they hate each other to reconnecting ten years later and attempting to be platonic best friends, all while falling in love. Junior Maeve McGean agreed that the writing is key to a rom-com’s success. They said that sometimes writers are “relying on the fact that you as a viewer want [the protagonists] to fall in love. You as a viewer know it’s a rom-com, so you know that
they’re going to end up together. But the writers aren’t actually doing the work to convince people that they like each other.” For a genre rooted in chemistry and romance, the characters actually liking each other is essential. When this chemistry and romance is believable, you can escape into rom-coms, not just use them as a distraction. You can experience what you wish you had said or what you hope to find in the future. Senior Owen Lasko said, “Movies are a really good way to recapture emotions that you had, but you don’t get to access without experiencing them [again]…you [get] to see the relationship that you want to have even if you don’t quite have that.” Essman echoed this idea. She said that rom-coms “[make] you look at the relationships in your own life and find the magic in them…[movies can] show you two people who are finding love with someone they never expected to find it with. And they drive each other crazy. And it’s beautiful.” Rom-coms may receive criticism for being overly idealized portrayals of life and love, but idealism can inspire us to hope for better. They can prompt us to reflect on the ways that we give and receive love, and the dawn of pandemic life in 2020 called for that idealism. As the world went into lockdown, our collective college comingof-age story—a montage of late night
