The Best Rom-Coms for Being Single on Valentine’s Day
Valentine's Day as a single person doesn't feel easy or happy; it feels like the whole world is in love and singles are on the outside. A Valentine's Day rom-com doesn't scream “joyful” for those without a partner this Valentine's Day, but every flip of the channel reveals more and more rom-coms.
Despite how it may feel, quite a few films stick out as “made for singles” to help alleviate those down-and-out single on Valentine's Day feelings.
1. Under the Tuscan Sun
Diane Lane and Sandra Oh star in this touching tale about what comes next when a marriage falls apart.
Frances Mayes (Lane) discovers her husband has been having an affair, and when she finds out, her world breaks apart. As her life spirals out of control, Frances' best friend Patti (Oh) encourages her to take a trip to Italy on her own to experience new and exciting things and get back in touch with herself. On her trip, Frances falls in love with a ramshackle villa and decides to take a chance on it. She buys the villa, moves her life to Italy, and begins the process of rebuilding it and herself.
2. Forgetting Sarah Marshall
The star-studded cast of this early Aughts classic keeps audiences laughing while also comforting them through being single on the most romantic day of the year.
Jason Segel stars as Peter Bretter, a struggling musician with a famous girlfriend, TV star Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell). After Sarah dumps him out of the blue, Peter travels to Hawaii in an attempt to move on somewhere beautiful. But when he gets there, he finds Sarah and her new boyfriend (Russell Brand) at the same hotel he booked.
Mila Kunis, Paul Rudd, Jonah Hill, and Bill Hader all star alongside the powerhouse trio to create a movie that stands up even years later and feels great to watch when single on Valentine's Day.
3. He's Just Not That Into You
Loosely based on the self-help book of the same name, He's Just Not That Into You features a killer ensemble cast.
Following friends all in their 20s and 30s, the film takes a look at the different forms love comes in and just how tricky communication and romance can be in the pursuit of true love. Jennifer Anniston, Ginnifer Goodwin, Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Connelly, and more keep the movie feeling funny, compelling, thoughtful, and heartbreaking.
4. Promising Young Woman
Oscar-winner Emerald Fennell's film Promising Young Woman feels like the feminist film of the century.
Cassie (Carey Mulligan), a med school dropout who works in a fun coffee shop by day but participates in questionable activities at night, seeks vengeance for the sexual assault of her best friend. Her best friend committed suicide after her assault and holds her assaulter responsible for it. Cassie's mission for vengeance leads her into dangerous situations she might not be prepared to handle.
5. How To Be Single
Starring Allison Brie, Dakota Johnson, Rebel Wilson, and Leslie Mann, How to Be Single follows four friends who navigate love and learn who they are in New York City.
Alice (Johnson) decides she needs a break from her boyfriend and dumps him “temporarily” before moving to New York City to live with her sister (Mann) and take a job as a paralegal. At her new job, she meets Robin (Wilson), who loves to party, embraces one-night stands, and loves to hang out with bartender Tom. Through Tom, they meet Lucy (Brie), who attempts to use science and dating apps to find the perfect man.
The four women learn about themselves, leaning on one another for love and support, showing that sometimes the love people need doesn't come from romantic relationships.
6. Breakfast at Tiffany's
Truman Capote's novel transformed into a classic with an eternal place in the film halls of fame…especially for folks single on Valentine's Day.
Audrey Hepburn stars as Holly Golightly, a woman who enjoys escorting gentlemen on nights out in exchange for a few bills here and there. Her male counterpart, who she calls Paul, moves into the apartment above her and falls deeply in love with the quirky young woman who visits mobsters in Sing-Sing and has a cat named Cat, and enjoys eating breakfast in front of Tiffany's. But Holly and love don't seem to mix.
7. How Stella Got Her Groove Back
Starring the incomparable Oscar-winner Angela Bassett, How Stella Got Her Groove Back puts the star in star-studded casts. Alongside Bassett, Taye Diggs stars as Winston Shakespeare, Whoopi Goldberg as Delilah Abraham, and Regina King as Vanessa.
The film follows 40-year-old stockbroker Stella, who has, thus far, been unlucky in love as she heads out on a Jamaican vacation with her best friend Delilah. Stella has a fling with a 20-year-old local, Winston Shakespeare, who sweeps her off her feet. But when her vacation comes to an end, Stella finds her feelings for Winston might just last past the vacation.
8. The Break-up
Breakups don't always go to plan, but what happens when a couple breaks up and refuses to move out of their shared condo?
Jennifer Anniston and Vince Vaughn star as Brooke and Gary, a couple who call it quits on their partnership but can't call it quits on living together. They both love their condo and refuse to move out. No matter what their friends do to try to get them to give in amicably, the two refuse and quickly become hostile roommates out for metaphorical blood.
9. Palm Springs
Andy Samberg and Cristin Milioti star in a time-loop movie that throws two unlikely characters together at a Palm Springs wedding.
After a strange night that ends with her potential hookup, Nyles, being shot, Sarah wakes up and realizes that she's reliving yesterday. It turns out that Nyles also relives the same day. The two do what they can to enjoy the time loop they can't escape until Sarah just can't do it anymore and attempts to bust them out.
10. Someone Great
The Netflix film starring Gina Rodriguez, DeWanda Wise, and Brittany Snow examines what happens after a relationship falls apart when not everyone in the relationship feels ready.
Reeling from a breakup she didn't see coming, Jenny ropes her two best friends into a wild night of adventures as a final hurrah before she moves from New York City to San Francisco to pursue her career. Throughout the night, Jenny feels the pressure of her recently ended relationship and has to figure out how to let it go and move on.
11. My Best Friend's Wedding
Julia Roberts, Dermot Mulroney, and Cameron Diaz star in a quintessential 90s movie that feels like a rom-com but without the happy ending.
Julianne (Roberts) and her childhood best friend Michael (Mulroney) had a deal to marry one another if they found themselves single at 28. Four days before her 28th birthday, Michael announces his engagement to his 20-year-old bride (Diaz), and Julianne realizes she might have loved Michael all along. She heads to his wedding, intending to put it to an end, but things don't quite go according to plan.
12. The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement
The second in the famous Princess Diaries series, Royal Engagement, sees Mia poised to take on the throne of Genovia, but a newly revealed clause in the laws of the land prevents Mia from ascending to the throne without first securing a proper husband.
Beautiful romance abounds in the film, but the movie's most important message says romantic love doesn't exist as the only answer, and strong women deserve a space and a voice just like anyone else.
13. The Last Five Years
Based on a Broadway show, The Last Five Years sees a newly divorced couple working through the destruction of their marriage in their own way, both singing about the way their marriage fell apart.
The film follows Cathy (Anna Kendrick) and Jamie (Jeremy Jordan) through their five-year marriage, beginning with the start of their relationship. The narrative details their two timelines separated until they converge, their original songs intertwining to tell the poignant story of their failed relationship.
14. Uptown Girls
The late, great Brittany Murphy and the incredible Dakota Fanning star in Uptown Girls, a classic feel-good movie from the 00s that shows love comes in all sorts of forms, from all sorts of unexpected places.
Molly (Murphy) has lived off the estate of her late rockstar father for her whole life, but when she discovers that her father's accountant has embezzled all her money, and with no parents to turn to, she doesn't know what to do. She moves in with her best friend on the condition that she gets a job. She takes on a job as a nanny to Ray (Fanning), a little girl who eats nannies for breakfast. The two struggle to find a groove with one another, but the love that begins to form between the two helps heal them both.
15. P.S. I Love You
A Valentine's Day spent grieving requires viewing P.S. I Love You, the classic film based on the Cecelia Ahern novel of the same name.
Holly (Hilary Swank) has lost her husband Gerry (Gerard Butler) to cancer, and she doesn't feel ready to face reality without him. Locked in her apartment, grieving her loss, Holly receives a letter from beyond the grave. It turns out Gerry left her ten messages, working behind the scenes as he died, to leave her with a little support and love from him during her first year without him.
Poignant, heartbreaking, and powerful, the film examines how love doesn't ever really die.
16. (500) Days of Summer
Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel star in an indie darling that inspired thousands of songs, poems, and writings about Manic Pixie Dream Girls and the men who think they love them.
Tom (Gordon-Levitt) falls madly in love with Summer (Deschanel), the quirky new girl at his company, but as quickly as she enters his life, she leaves it. The film unfolds non-linearly as it follows the 500 days of Tom and Summer's relationship, rolling out the days they spent together and the lessons Tom learned from his time with Summer.
17. The First Wive's Club
Bette Midler, Goldie Hawn, and Diane Keaton star in The First Wive's Club, a film that centers on the fury of a woman scorned.
After their best friend jumps from her penthouse window, three best friends (Midler, Hawn, and Keaton) realize their best friend killed herself out of rage and heartbreak over her husband divorcing her and moving on with a younger woman. The women realize their ex-husbands have taken advantage of them, and they decide to take matters into their own hands and enact a little vengeance.
18. Gone Girl
Rosamund Pike and Ben Affleck star in the psychological thriller based on the Gillian Flynn novel of the same name.
Nick (Affleck) and Amy Dunne (Pike) have a seemingly glamorous life and a seemingly blissful marriage, but when Amy disappears under mysterious circumstances, it seems their marriage hides more than a few secrets. Nick becomes the prime suspect in his wife's disappearance, and their seemingly wonderful life begins to unravel.
19. Eat, Pray, Love
Based on Elizabeth Gilbert's autobiographical book of the same name, Eat, Pray, Love focuses on the beauty of loving oneself.
Julia Roberts stars as Liz Gilbert, a woman who finds herself questioning everything she has ever thought she wanted and everything she has. Newly divorced with a life in upheaval, Liz decides she needs to find herself on an extended journey that takes her from Italy to India to Bali as she learns who she wants to be and what she needs.
20. Girls Trip
The star-studded cast of Girls Trip includes Queen Latifah, Tiffany Haddish, Jada Pinkett Smith, and Regina Hall as a group of best girlfriends who come together for a trip after drifting apart over the years. In New Orleans, the women rekindle their friendship as they dance, party, laugh, and learn about themselves and one another.