15 best romance movies to watch on Netflix, Hulu, HBO and more right now

Happy Valentine’s Day weekend, Polygon readers! We’ve got something for you this year. Don’t worry about getting us something, too — we’re just happy you’re here.

We compiled a list of our favourite romance movies on streaming for Polygon. Whether you’re looking for a light-hearted romantic comedy, a moving romance filled with meaning, a genre movie fused with romance, or something in between, we have something for you. There’s just one rule for our selections: the romance in it has to be real and tangible, no matter the genre it technically falls under. That includes options on Netflix, Hulu, HBO Max, and even some available on free platforms that don’t require a subscription at all.

Relax, get a bowl of popcorn and take in these great selections made by the Polygon staff. Have any favorite recipes of yours? We’d love to hear about your favorites in the comments.

10 Things That I Hate About Yourself

Image: Touchstone Pictures, Buena Vista Pictures

Of all the “teen movie adaptations of classic literature” out there, 10 Things That I Hate About Yourself It is the most romantic. It is a very loose adaptation of Shakespeare’s The Taming and the Reaping of the ShrewBianca is a popular teenage girl played by Lilisa Oleynik. Kat, her strong older sister, has to approve of Bianca’s relationship. Cameron (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), a new boy with a crush on Bianca pays Patrick (Heath Ledger), to win Kat. It is the sort of romantic comedy where much of the tension comes from the leads butting heads and realizing they’re not so different after all — with an extra dose of two vastly different sisters learning to understand each other. Kat and Patrick definitely take center stage here, but Cameron and Bianca’s romance isn’t half-bad either. —Petrana Radulovic

Ten Things I Hate about YouYou can stream it on Disney Plus.

One Night, a Girl Goes Home Alone

Image: Logan Pictures, SpectreVision

The movie is romantic and vampire-themed, although not in the way one would expect. This movie is far from the horrifying vampire tales. Dracula Or the timid abstinence Twilight, director Ana Lily Amirpour describes her movie as the “first Iranian vampire spaghetti western.” The movie follows a young man named Arash who lives in a semi-abandoned ghost town called Bad City, where he meets a nameless skateboarding vampire girl. They quickly become close friends in Bad City and begin a sweet, but mostly quiet, love story. —Austen Goslin

One Night, a Girl Goes Home Alone You can stream it on You will be shakenAnd HooplaYou can also get a librarycard.

The Before trilogy

Columbia Pictures

Truth be told, the Before Trilogy is nothing short of miraculous. Had the story of Celine (Julie Delpy) and Jesse’s (Ethan Hawke) whirlwind Vienna romance simply concluded with Before Sunrise’s bittersweet ending, it alone would have easily endured as one of the greatest romantic dramas of its era. But when joined with 2004’s Before sunset and 2013’s After Midnight however, Richard Linklater’s decade-spanning romance culminates into something even more transcendent: a meditation on the peculiar tenacity and tenuousness of love under the strain of time and circumstance. It is a life-changing experience to watch The Before Trilogy. You should share it with someone you love. —Toussaint Elgan

Before SunriseYou can stream it on HooplaAnd Tubi; Before sunset You can stream it on Tubi After MidnightYou can stream it on IMDb TVWith ads

Carol

Image: Number 9 Films, Film4 Productions, Killer Films

This is the moment CarolWhen it was finally released, it was enshrined in the history of WLW cinema. A lushly drawn, beautifully shot period romance about a rich near-divorcee and a shy salesgirl falling deeply in love — and one where they are not in the end forced apart by historical circumstances. You can’t beat the outfits. Gay-zes all around the room! Inspired loosely by real events Cate Blanchett is a gun! —Susana Polo

CarolYou can stream it for free, with no ads. Roku, Vudu, TubiAnd Pluto.

Don’t Go Breaking My Heart

Image: Media Asia, Milkyway Image

Johnnie To, one of the most important directors today is equally skilled in both hard-boiled triad criminal dramas as well as lighthearted romantic comedies. 2011’s Don’t Go Breaking My Heart falls in the latter category, and is one of the many high marks of the Hong Kong director’s legendary career. After a breakup, Chi-yan is now an analyst at an investment bank. She finds herself caught in a triangle. On one side, there’s Sean (Louis Koo), a CEO who works across the street from Chi-yan and yearns for her through the tall corporate glass windows that separate them. On the other, there’s Kevin (the always-dreamy Daniel Wu), an alcoholic former architect who helps Chi-Yan move on and is inspired by her to start creating again. It’s a charming, sincere and funny time of romance. —Pete Volk

Don’t Go Breaking My HeartAvailable to stream online Netflix.

Hiroshima Mon Amour

Image from the Criterion Collection

It is not something I would recommend. Hiroshima mon amouR is roughly one trillion reasons. Number one, it’s a hard hang, beginning with an extended montage that includes real-world atrocities. The central couple, Elle & Lui, keep comparing their mundane lives to the Hiroshima bombing. The pair’s love story, which takes even longer to jumpstart, is non-linear and laced with flashbacks that range from minutes to milliseconds, like sparks of traumatic memories that the characters hurriedly extinguish before they burn out of control. It’s the least pleasurable film on this list.

That’s purposeful. Alain Resnais is a troll. His stunning photography and poetic editing are constantly challenged by documentary-like reminders about the cruelty of human beings as a whole as well as the inability of individuals to understand the pain and feelings of others. But it’s this ugliness, and how it’s shared with the audience, that I find unforgettable. Elle and Lui will be little more than mere strangers. They’ll walk down empty streets, or in bars, and then casually reveal their damage to each other. Elle is a movie star, and she wants love to be so great that everything will disappear before it. It is revealed that war and some of her most regrettable romantic choices have ruined her life, sending her on a quest for love all over the globe. Of course, we can’t erase the past, something Elle can’t see despite literally being in Hiroshima.

Why should you watch this movie? Because we don’t get many romantic films that depict people as the selfish, complicated, passionate, despicable, lovable people they actually are. The best comparison I can muster is Linklater’s Before trilogy, where we both love and despise the couple for their egocentrism. But Resnais’ work goes much further in its 90-minutes, reminding us that it’s a miracle we can communicate, let alone find love, when each person is already a walking ball of contradictions and inner-conflict. —Chris Plante

Hiroshima Mon AmourIt is streamable on the Criterion Channel.

Beale Street could talk

Image: Annapurna Pictures, Plan B Entertainment

Barry Jenkins’ follow-up to the Oscar-winning Moonlight is this tender adaptation of James Baldwin’s 1974 novel. Filmed in Harlem, in the beginning of 1970s, it follows Tish (KiKi Lane) and Fonny (“Stephen James), a young Black couple that is simply trying to survive: apartment hunting and dealing with rival families. Their lives become chaotic when Fonny is charged with a crime that he cannot have committed. A stellar supporting cast includes Regina King, Teyonah Perry, Teyonah Ellis, Brian Tyree Henry and Colman Domingo. Beale Street It is a masterpiece in an instant with transcendent scores to match. —PV

Beale Street could talkYou can stream it on Hulu.

Love is in the mood

Criterion Collection Photo

When someone sees one Wong Kar-wai film, they often immediately want to see all of them, but not at once: they’re movies best enjoyed as chance encounters, beguiling strangers one spends two hours with at a bar or on a train before continuing on their way. Chow Mowwan (Tony Leung), and Su Lishen (Maggie Cheung), become suspicious of each other’s affairs and begin to form a new relationship. It’s an achingly beautiful movie, full of deep reds and tight, lonely spaces, one of those stories where nothing and everything happens all at once. It’s kinda like that, where two people only begin to realize the things they do not have. —Joshua Rivera

Love is in the moodYou can stream it on HBO MaxAnd Criterion Channel.

The Mummy

Universal Pictures

There are few pulp adventures where the hero wins out and romance is as tangible as the MacGuffin or monster. Harrison Ford and Karen Allen might have electric chemistry, but the whole “Indiana Jones and Marian Ravenwood first dated when she was underage” makes enjoying it a little tough to sit back and enjoy.

It’s not so with The MummyThis romcom is committed as much as possible to the juicy tropes and wit of Opposites-style romcoms as it is to the juicy tropes and boobytrapped Egyptian tombs. The slow burn between hardened adventurer-with-a-heart-of-gold Rick O’Connell and buttoned-up-librarian-who-blossoms-under-the-call-of-destiny Evelyn Carnahan is the core stuff of romance novels.

It doesn’t hurt that Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz are two of the hottest people Hollywood has ever produced. There’s a reason that loving The MummyThe bisexual community uses the memetic trope “” to refer to a group that does not include openly gay characters. There’s something here for Everywhere romantic. —SP

The MummyAvailable to stream online HBO Max.

Once

Image: Fox Searchlight Pictures

John Carney’s romantic musical recognizes the power of intimacy and a pair of dulcet vocals. Shot on a shoestring budget around Ireland, the film tracks the whirlwind weekend of an Irish busker (Actual Folk Guitarist Glen Hansard) and a Czech flower seller (Actual Singer-Songwriter Markéta Irglová). When “Guy” discovers that “Girl” is as musically talented and emotionally torn as himself, his impulsive, whimsical self takes over, imagining what they could do together in a recording studio. As they create a series of songs, “Guy” and “Girl” become closer, understanding each other’s deeper romantic flaws. Carney, Hansard, and Irglová worked together to create Once’s playlist of original songs, and each one feels as important as any bit of dialogue or scene setting in the script. The musical’s swells can spark real fires. —Matt Patches

OnceYou can stream it on Amazon Prime VideoYou can also get ads for no cost. Tubi.

Portrait of Lady on Fire

Foto by Neon

I wish I could watch this movie again for the first time, but I’ll settle for watching it over and over. Portrait of Lady on Fire is absolutely exquisite, gorgeous, and cheeky — telling the tale of a woman hired to paint the portrait of another, for the sake of sending to a potential suitor. Of course, the two fall for each other — over the course of thorny portrait sessions, coastal walks, discussions of Eurydice and the nature of art and memory. The quiet longing! What a thrill to find your desire satisfied! This is the final period piece that explores queer women. It’s rooted in female gaze and doesn’t dwell on separation. Instead, it celebrates the beauty of love, intimacy and companionship. You can see the mirror in its place! If you don’t know it, you already know. The filmmaking is crisp, considered, and full of life — the slow burn made me consider both the nature of seeing and being seenThis is how to choose the best way to preserve that feeling of love, even when all memories are lost. —Nicole Clark

Portrait of Lady on FireThe stream is now available HuluAnd KanopyYou can also get a librarycard.

The Princess Bride

Image from Criterion Collection

The Princess BrideThis movie has it all. Swashbucklers. Epic adventures. Quoteable humor. Cary Elwes. And a beautiful romance to tie it all. It’s a fairytale fantasy that plays with familiar tropes and breathes new life into them, a parody born out of love. This movie has inspired so many quotes and pop culture references that it is almost unbelievable. (Haha.)

Although it’s funny, the core of this joke is heartfelt. The Princess BrideButtercup and Wesley are in swoonworthy love. The loyalty, the dedication, the reconnection, the devotion — as you wish, indeed. Witty, charming, and deeply romantic The Princess BridThis is a great fantasy adventure with a sweet framing device. A grandfather reads his grandson a story to bed, and it preserves William Goldman’s narrative better than an easy adaptation. —PR

The Princess BrideAvailable to stream online Disney Plus.

A Great Person

Photo: Sarah Shatz

What’s great about A Great Person is that it’s not a love story per se, but rather a story about how people grow through the act of love. Gina Rodriguez portrays Jenny, an American music journalist. Her longtime boyfriend Nate Stanfield leaves her when she gets the job that is her dream in San Francisco. Jenny, who is still hurt from the ending of her nine-year relationship with Nate, ventures out to meet her best friend Erin (DeWanda Wilkes) and Blair (Brittany Snow) before moving on. She also reflects back on Nate’s life and the events leading up to it. It’s a surprisingly deep and genuinely funny romantic comedy about letting go of fear and regret, making peace with the past, and embracing all that love has to offer in the present. —TE

A Great Personstreamable on Netflix.

Thomas Crown Affair

Image courtesy of M Home Entertainment

They don’t make heist movies hotter than this. John McTiernan’s remake of the 1968 Steve McQueen/Faye Dunaway classic is a steamy romp, with Pierce Brosnan and Rene Russo at their sexiest. Brosnan plays Thomas Crown, an arrogant playboy billionaire who is also the world’s greatest art thief in his spare time (in many ways, this is Brosnan’s Batman movie). Russo is Catherine Banning, an insurance investigator tasked with solving and recovering Crown’s most recent daring theft. The two fall for each other over the course of a delicious cat-and-mouse game, culminating in an unforgettable, intricately choreographed sequence set to Nina Simone’s “Sinnerman.” —PV

Thomas Crown AffairYou can stream it for free, with no ads. Roku, TubiAnd Pluto.

You can weather it

GKIDS Films – Image

While not quite as popular as director Makoto Shinkai’s previous movie, Your name, Weathering with YouThis anime sequel is filled with as much romance and beauty as the original. Weathering with youHodaka Morishima is a young boy living in Tokyo who has to live alone. Hodaka is introduced to Hina Amano by a girl who controls the weather. The two fall in love as it continues to rain in Tokyo. The movie’s gorgeous animation and achingly sweet plot help tell a beautiful story about choosing love, even when knowing how it ends. — AG

Weather With YouYou can stream it on HBO MaxAnd HooplaYou can also get a librarycard.