Ah, Amour

As the old year ends and a fresh new year begins thoughts turn to what do you do during all those cold, dark and stormy days and nights?  For the unromantic, it can be a pretty dismal time of year when football ends, taxes loom and basketball is just hitting its stride.  But for those of us in love with love (or hoping to recapture that feeling) cold days + cold nights = incentive to coddle, cuddle and consummate.
 

Just in time for
Valentine's Day,
a little Romantic Inspiration

What woman hasn't wanted to be Scarlet O'Hara just once in her life? And what man wouldn't love to be Rhett Butler? Gone with the Wind continues to charm audiences  even 62 years later with its sweeping love story spanning the years of the civil war and the decade following. It is the movie all others are measured by and produced the first Academy Award® for an African American Actress (Hattie McDaniel as Mame) in history. Considering this was 1940's USA where we still lived in a segregated society, this is a well deserved but remarkable achievement.

In terms of tickets sold, Gone with the Wind is still the champ.  In terms of romance, chasing the one that will never be yours and not appreciating what you have until too late, this film is a great reminder of the precious gift love can be if only you open your eyes to see it. TOP

Truman Capote's wonderful tale of singles life in New York casts Holly Go Lightly played by Audrey Hepburn as the ultimate scatter-brained party-girl who makes her living by earning $50 every time she goes to the restroom on a date and by carrying coded messages to a mobster in prison.  She is set on marrying wealthy but ends up falling for kept man and starving author whom she calls Fred, but is actually Paul.

Confused, frightened and terrified to commit, Holly won't even name her cat because this would mean they were responsible for each other.  The last scene is one you'll remember and cry over as in the pouring rain she searches for Cat after abandoning him and opens her eyes to true love in a rain drenched kiss.

This film touches a nerve with anyone whom has ever been afraid to love yet desperately longs for it.  Audrey Hepburn is at her absolute best and turns a somewhat narcissistic character into a woman most men would long to love.
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The Audrey Hepburn
DVD Collection:  $44.99

• Roman Holiday

• Sabrina

• Breakfast at Tiffany's
   

What makes this movie a phenomenal love story is its  realism and its exploration of the less romantic sides of life like deception, dissolution, inner strength, grief and determination. 

An Officer and a Gentleman is really a coming of age story about a man in his late twenties determined to change his life.  He enters the Officer Candidate training and discovers an inner courage and strength he never knew existed.  During this time he falls in love with a young factory worker, discovers the harsher truths of human nature and becomes disillusioned by life. Like many men he tries to deny his love for her and escape.  Also like many men he ultimately discovers his life is empty without her and in the end he comes back, sweeps her off her feet and carries her into forever.

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This award winning interpretation of Shakespeare’s most beloved tale of star-crossed lovers is as epic in its visual elements and costumes as it is in the quality of the acting. It proves that this Renaissance man is truly the age’s master storyteller and still holds the key to enduring and unequivocal sensuality. Viva la romance! We also rated this movie as #7 in our top Sensual Movies of all time.

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• The Big Sleep

• The Maltese Falcon

• Casablanca

• Key Largo

Humphrey Bogart plays a saloon keeper heavily distraught over the future and the one time lover of Ingrid Bergman.  When she wanders into his Gin Joint of all those in the world, the sparks begin to fly and the old romantic feelings are once again rekindled.  In the end Bogart does the hardest thing for any man in love.  He lets her go in one of the most famous good-bye scenes ever recorded on film.   TOP

What makes this film a great love story is it shows the sacrifices people who love each other make in order to love each other despite the odds and the disapproval of others.  This is a tear jerker as in the end one of the two does die, leaving the other to face the world alone. If you're looking for uplifting, Love Story is not your movie.  If you're looking for an emotional tear-jerker, pop the popcorn and draw up a chair. 

This film was marketed to a generation of Baby Boomers proclaiming "Love means never having to say you are sorry," which is probably the worst advice any person has ever received.  It may also be why Boomers have the highest divorce rate in history as this movie is cited by them as their favorite romantic movie.  Probably not, but so other generations don't take the advertising to heart, we should clarify.

Love means having the humility and respect for another to say you're sorry, even if you are not at fault.  Love means having to say you're sorry, often and meaning it.

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The first animated film ever nominated for Best Picture, Beauty and the Beast exemplifies the foundations of true love in a stirring adventure based upon the classic fairytale.  Beauty and the Beast is Disney storytelling at its best and the story explores the depths of unconditional love. 

Though Angela Lansbury's voice is easy to identify, it is Jerry Orbach's (Law & Order) rendition of the love-sick candlestick Pierre that steals the show. All of the characters are memorable and the computer-generated graphics are a treat for the eyes.  Beauty and the Beast is a love story ageless and devine.

Each engaged to others, Grant and Kerr meet on a cruise ship and turn society upside down as they fall in love with each other.  Agreeing to meet New Years Eve a top the Empire State Building, tragedy intercedes and the union is postponed.   In true romantic fashion, neither can forget the other but both believe the other does not want them. 

In the end the truth comes out and a lesson in love is revealed showing that true love overcomes all obstacles and accepts each unconditionally.

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Nora Ephron's rendition of modern love is much more realistic than any of the films previously mentioned. It plays on the love-hate relationship most encounter when falling in love and the terror that accompanies that letting go and letting in of another.  Rich in both comedy and drama it explores the long building friendship between a man and a woman over the course of many years and many loves.  When Harry Met Sally will have you believing in fate and taking a second look at those whom enrich your life.  This film drives home the greatest indicator of a healthy marriage, that of friendship, respect and mutual trust.

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