Similar Products – The History of Romantic Comedies

Rom Com’s also known as Romantic Comedies started from the late 1590’s and Shakespeare was the first writer to create romantic comedies. These plays include; A Midsummers Nights Dream, Twelfth Night and Much Ado About Nothing. Romantic Comedies focus on the lives of misunderstood young lovers and this usually avoids using serious satire. It was not till the medieval period that romance

was taken seriously.

Juno (2007) is one example of a romantic comedy. This film is about a young teenage girl who makes the mistake of getting herself pregnant at 16, she is not the girl you would expect to get pregnant at a young age. This film stars Ellen Page and Michael Cera. This is a modern take on romantic comedies.

Another example of a romantic comedy is When Harry met Sally which was out in 1989, this film is an older take on rom coms and it has a different satire to Juno. This film is about a young man and woman who have not seen each other for 12 years and they suddenly encounter in New York City.

The basic plot of a romantic comedy is that two people, usually a man and a woman, meet and then part ways due to an argument or other contrived obstacles. Initially, these two people do not become romantically involved, because they believe that they do not like each other, because one of them already has a partner, or social pressures. However, the screenwriters leave obvious clues that suggest that the characters are in fact attracted to each other, or that they would be a good love match.While the two people are separated, one or both individuals then realize that they are "perfect" for each other, or that they are in love with the other person. Then, after one of the two makes some spectacular effort to find the other person and declare their love, (this is sometimes called the grand gesture), or due to an astonishing coincidental encounter, the two meet again. Then, perhaps with some comic friction or awkwardness, they declare their love for each other and the film ends happily.

There are many variations on this basic plotline. Sometimes, instead of the two lead characters ending up in each other's arms, another love match will be made between one of the principal characters and a secondary character (e.g., My Best Friend's Wedding). Alternatively, the film may be a rumination on the impossibility of love, as in Woody Allen's film Annie Hall. The basic format of a romantic comedy film can be found in much earlier sources, such as Shakespeare plays like Much Ado About Nothing and A Midsummer Night's Dream. A movie in which a romantic intercourse could happen, but does not, is referred to as Platonic Comedy.

One of the conventions of romantic comedy films is the contrived encounter of two potential romantic partners in unusual or comic circumstances, which film critics such as Roger Ebert or the Associated Press' Christy Lemire have called a "meet-cute" situation. During a "meet-cute", scriptwriters often create a humorous sense of awkwardness between the two potential partners by depicting an initial clash of personalities or beliefs, an embarrassing situation, or by introducing a comical misunderstanding or mistaken identity situation. Sometimes the term is used without a hyphen (a "meet cute"), or as a verb, as in "to meet cute."

In films, the attraction between the lead characters must be established quickly. The subject matter of romantic comedies are the obstacles that the potential pair must face before they can acknowledge, fulfill, or consummate their love, and the audience must care about the relationship enough to finish the movie. The meet-cute, by virtue of its unusual situation, helps to fix the potential relationship in the viewers' minds, and the spark of the meeting is the impetus by which initial vicissitudes of the developing relationship are overcome.