The Love List
‘In the Mood for Love’ (2000)
Stream it on HBO Max.
Wong Kar-wai’s tale of unrequited passion is a sensual feast. Set in Hong Kong in 1962, it stars Tony Leung as a journalist who moves into an apartment with his wife but falls for his neighbor, a married secretary played by Maggie Cheung.
This film creates a delicious atmosphere, with help from the luscious florals that will make you covet William Chang Suk-ping’s costumes and a swoon-worthy soundtrack of Nat King Cole standards and Chinese tunes. Sophisticated, astute and poetic, this is the pick if you don’t want to skimp on the swank.
‘The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love’ (1995)
Stream it on the Criterion Channel.
Maria Maggenti’s low-budget film about love in the time of Generation X is one of the sunnier and sweeter films of ’90s New Queer Cinema.
Randy (Laurel Holloman) is a working-class tomboy who strikes up a romance with her wealthy high school classmate Evie (Nicole Ari Parker). Randy finds support from the lesbian aunt who’s raising her. But when Evie’s mother finds her daughter and Randy in bed, it’s not the kind of coming out that PFLAG dreams are made of. In screwball fashion, the final act playfully fulfills the film’s title promise.
‘Love Jones’ (1997)
Rent it on most major platforms.
The only feature film by the writer-director Theodore Witcher is this dramedy about the relationship between two artists in Chicago: Darius, a poet (Larenz Tate), and Nina, a photographer (Nia Long). The film explores what happens when there’s no easy answer to the question: Is this the one?
The film’s soundtrack, which includes Cassandra Wilson and the Brand New Heavies, was a hit, and the chemistry between Tate and Long was, and still is, extra hot. Witcher has said he still gets stopped by fans who are smitten with his take on Black 20-somethings making art and looking for love.
‘Love Crazy’ (1941)
Rent it on most major platforms.
William Powell and Myrna Loy were already household names for playing a married detective team in the “Thin Man” films when they starred in Jack Conway’s screwball comedy about a man who pretends to be nuts to stop his wife from seeking a divorce. One of the film’s many blissful moments is Powell in drag as his character’s matronly sister.
Bosley Crowther, in his review for The Times, called this “one of the craziest love stories ever spread on a screen.” How crazy? “Everyone who worked on the picture,” he wrote, “must have trained rigidly on a routine of old slapstick comedies and a diet of locoweed.”
‘Down With Love’ (2003)
Stream it on HBO Max.
Peyton Reed’s musical comedy is a pastiche homage to the deliciously frothy films of Rock Hudson and Doris Day. Ewan McGregor plays a womanizing journalist who tries to woo a feminist author, played by Renée Zellweger, as part of his exposé on her manifesto pushing for equality between the sexes.
If you’re a sucker for suave playboys, “Sex and the Single Girl” sensibilities, extravagant movie musical dance numbers and ’60s Givenchy, this one’s for you.
The Hate List
‘Gaslight’ (1944)
Stream it on the Criterion Channel.
Ingrid Bergman stars in George Cukor’s chilling psychological thriller as a woman who slowly loses her grip on sanity as her conniving husband, played with sinister smarm by Charles Boyer, plants doubts about memories she knows to be true.
Bergman won her first of three Academy Awards for her vivid performance as the wife on her way to madness. Angela Lansbury almost steals the film as her sassy maid.
‘Valentine’ (2001)
Stream it on Shudder.
David Boreanaz and Denise Richards star in this horror film about a murderous psycho in a Cupid mask who targets a group of women with ornately decorated Valentine’s Day cards with messages like: “Roses are red. Violets are blue. They’ll need dental records to identify you.” Could the killer be nerdy Jeremy, whom they teased in middle school?
Jamie Blanks’s film is scary-stupid date night fun, especially for horror fans who will appreciate an old-fashioned slasher film with a cutting sense of humor and dudes who wear chokers.
‘Faces’ (1968)
Stream it on HBO Max.
Trust, friendship, romance — they all disintegrate in the brutally candid films of John Cassavetes. That’s especially true in this drama about a middle-aged couple (John Marley and Lynn Carlin) who explore ill-fated romantic shenanigans outside their troubled marriage.
Shot on grainy 16 millimeter in black and white, this is a wrenching introduction to the unsteady camerawork and uncomfortable close-ups that make Cassavetes’s naturalist storytelling so affecting. Watching this punch-to-the-gut takedown of a fragile marriage is as bleak as it is mesmerizing.
‘Audition’ (1999)
Stream it on Tubi.
Takashi Miike’s shocking thriller is about a middle-aged widower (Ryo Ishibashi) who sits in on phony movie auditions as a (creepy) ruse to meet a wife. The woman he falls for (Eihi Shiina) is a meek former ballet dancer who, as he fatefully learns, is a torture virtuoso and syringe enthusiast who’s off her rocker.
Even if you have a strong stomach for slice-and-dice scares, don’t be shocked if your nerves take a beating during this film, especially when it takes an unexpectedly monstrous turn — then puts the pedal to the metal.
‘Enough’ (2002)
Stream it on Peacock.
Jennifer Lopez may be America’s sweetheart bride in her new rom-com “Marry Me.” But for the besieged young mom she plays in Michael Apted’s melodramatic thriller, love sours.
Lopez plays a working-class woman who learns that her wealthy, abusive husband (Billy Campbell) has been cheating. She and her daughter (Tessa Allen) go on the run, with her husband fast on her heels. Desperate to protect her child, she takes up self-defense and, in a potent finale, pops open a can of whoop-ass that’s so satisfying, you’ll need a cigarette when it’s over.
Source: Movies - nytimes.com
