Random Rom-Com Plots That Are Actually Stuff Of Nightmares (12 items)

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  (#4) Overboard

  • Goldie Hawn, Kurt Russell, Roddy McDowall, Katherine Helmond, Edward Herrmann, Mike Hagerty, Frank Buxton, Frank Campanella, Rielle Hunter, Jared Rushton, Jeffrey Wiseman, Doris Hess, Carol Williard, Henry Alan Miller, Brian Price, Jamie Wild

  A snotty rich heiress (Goldie Hawn) falls off a boat and gets amnesia. A local carpenter (Kurt Russell) she once stiffed on a job sees her story on the news and tells her she is his wife. To get back at her, he then practically enslaves her, making her keep house and home while raising his brood of brats.

  Seen from this perspective, is Overboard in any way romantic? Or even a comedy? It is much more sinister than its rom-com façade would have you believe: a man turns a woman into his personal slave as his own brand of twisted revenge. And worst of all? They fall in love at the end. Stockholm Syndrome, anyone?
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  (#6) Love Actually

  • Keira Knightley, Elisha Cuthbert, Liam Neeson, January Jones, Denise Richards, Emma Thompson, Shannon Elizabeth, Hugh Grant, Claudia Schiffer, Alan Rickman, Colin Firth, Billy Bob Thornton, Rowan Atkinson, Laura Linney, Martin Freeman, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Andrew Lincoln, Bill Nighy, Sienna Guillory, Rodrigo Santoro, Martine McCutcheon, Ivana Miličević, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Richard Curtis, Frances de la Tour, Joanna Page, Declan Donnelly, Nancy Sorrell, Meredith Ostrom, Anthony McPartlin, Heike Makatsch, Gregor Fisher, Michael Parkinson, Julia Davis, Kris Marshall, Anne Reid, Edward Hardwicke, Marcus Brigstocke, Lúcia Moniz, Ruby Turner, Jo Whiley, Adam Godley, Margery Mason, Nina Sosanya, Brian Bovell, Olivia Olson, John Sharian, Meg Wynn Owen, Caroline John, Sheila Allen, Abdul Salis, Jamie Edgell, Peter Marinker, Shaughan Seymour, Gillian Barge, Rebecca Frayn, Sarah Holland, Arturo Venegas, Wes Butters, David Lynden Hall, Laura Rees, Rory MacGregor, Elisabeth Margoni, Jont, Lulu Popplewell, Glenn Conroy, Tuuli, Carla Vasconcelos, Bill Moody, Nat Udom, Emma Buckley, Dan Fredenburgh, Patrick Delaney, Stewart Howson, Paul Heasman, Richard Wills-Cotton, Adrian Preater, Kate Bowes Renna, Richard Hawley, June Flewett, Tony Lucken, Ciaran O'Driscoll, William Wadham, Georgia Flint, Joanna Thaw, Frank Moorey, Michael Fitzgerald, Keir Charles, Matt Harvey, Junior Simpson, Dave Fisher, Ines Boughanmi, Katharine Bailey, Catia Duarte, Yuk Sim Yau, Tiffany Boysell, Carol Carey, Terry Reece, Doraly Rosen, Nicola McRoy, Raul Atalaia, Helen Murton, Sarah McDougall, Clare Bennett, Hélder Costa, Katherine Poulton, Billy Campbell, Paul Slack, Tim Hatwell, Kate Glover, Wyllie Longmore, Vicki Murdoch, Amanda Garwood, Gemma Aston, Alan Barnes, Joanna Bacon, Igor Urdenko, Sarah Atkinson, Colin Coull

  Mark (Andrew Lincoln) is in love with Juliet (Keira Knightley), who also happens to be his best friend's wife. This already has the makings of a super uncomfortable dynamic, but Love Actually tries to spin it as endearing. Yet the things Mark does – like pretending to be a caroler and then holding up cue cards on Juliet's front stoop, informing her that he's in love with her – are more stalkerish than sweet.

  Dude, that is your best friend's wife. Do you have such little regard for both of them that you would choose to go down this road? Even Andrew Lincoln thought the character was a "creepy stalker."
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  (#1) My Best Friend's Wedding

  • Julia Roberts, Dermot Mulroney, Rupert Everett, Cameron Diaz, Paul Giamatti, Rachel Griffiths, Harry Shearer, Carrie Preston, Susan Sullivan, Bree Turner, M. Emmet Walsh, Philip Bosco, Christopher Masterson, Chelcie Ross, Paul Adelstein, Charlie Trotter, Rose Abdoo, Mike Bacarella, Robert Minkoff, Davenia McFadden, Joe Sikora, Burton Zucker, Charlotte Zucker, Nydia Rodriguez Terracina, Reese Foster, Anh Duong, Daisy Alexandra Sylbert-Torres, Lucy Pacquet, Ned Schmidtke, Gene Janson, Susan Breslau, JoBe Cerny, Sid Hillman, Mara Casey, Chris Lowe, Jerod Howard, Mary-Pat Green, Johnny White, Patricia E. Harrington, Mark Swenson, Kathi Copeland, Dominic Testa, Renata Scott, Tonray Ho, Amy Danles, Phillip Ingram, Jennifer McComb, Jo Farkas, Kevin Michael Doyle, Ray Uhler, Maridean Mansfield Shepard, Eric A. Pot, Molly Murphy, Anne Spradley-Montie, Kelly Sheerin, Leon 'Lee' Fuller, Shirley Kelly, Stephanie Burton, Jennifer Garrett, Shale Marks, Robert Velo, Michelle Hutchison, Norman Merrill, Raci Alexander, Larry Santori, George Bozonelos, Robert Sutter, Loretta Paoletti, Guillermo Tellez, Sharon Haight, Scott Kuhagen, Aida Baggio, Cassie Creasy

  Julianne (Julia Roberts) in My Best Friend's Wedding is supposed to be charming and goofy. Instead, she is despicable. The movie has its moments; Julianne's klutziness, for example, is always funny. But even expert pratfalls can't save her rotten character.

  Realizing she's been in love with her best friend (Dermot Mulroney) for years, Julianne sets out to stop his wedding. And not just stop it, but destroy the wedding and the lives of her supposed best friend and his fiancée. Julianne puts everyone through hell for one long wedding weekend, leaving emotional wreckage in her wake, and yet she's totally, inexplicably, forgiven by the time the credits roll.

  If My Best Friend's Wedding were a Lifetime movie and Julianne were played by Tori Spelling, it would be a really bad thriller. Instead, it's just a really bad rom-com.
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  (#12) 50 First Dates

  • Drew Barrymore, Adam Sandler, Dan Aykroyd, Rob Schneider, Maya Rudolph, Kevin James, Sean Astin, Missi Pyle, Kristin Bauer van Straten, Blake Clark, Amy Hill, Lusia Strus

  Lucy (Drew Barrymore) has short-term memory loss after getting in a car accident. Every day, she must relearn her life all over again, so Henry (Adam Sandler), who is in love with Lucy, must make her fall for him with each new day.

  Sounds sweet, right? Not so fast. Imagine waking up with a man you've never seen before and having him try to convince you that the two of you are in love. There's a word for that: brainwashing. Surely there are more positive and helpful ways to support someone with a traumatic brain injury?
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  (#9) Sabrina

  • Audrey Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart, William Holden, Martha Hyer, Ellen Corby, Marcel Dalio, John Williams, Francis X. Bushman, Walter Hampden, Nella Walker, Marcel Hillaire, Joan Vohs

  Both the 1954 original and the 1995 remake of Sabrina are chock-full of class discrepancies and unevolved thinking. There's a lot of the old, "people from this class shouldn't mix with that class" garbage. At one point, Sabrina's father tells her, "I like to think of life as a limousine. Though we are all riding together, we must remember our places. There's a front seat and a back seat and a window in between."

  Yeah, Sabrina, be content with your "place." Good fathering there, Dad.
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  (#7) While You Were Sleeping

  • Sandra Bullock, Monica Keena, Bill Pullman, Ally Walker, Peter Boyle, Jack Warden, Peter Gallagher, Glynis Johns, Rick Worthy, Michael Rispoli, Jason Bernard, Dick Cusack, Mike Bacarella, Susan Messing, Peter Siragusa, Margaret Travolta, Micole Mercurio, Shea Farrell, Kate Reinders, Bernie Landis, Marc Grapey, Gene Janson, Ann Whitney, Dobie Maxwell, Marcia Wright, Kevin Gudahl, Richard Pickren, Thomas Q. Morris, Megan Schaiper, James Krag, Krista Lally, Ruth Rudnick, Joel Hatch

  While You Were Sleeping was one of the first films to turn Sandra Bullock into American rom-com royalty. Too bad the movie is patently ridiculous, and it features a horrible central character with an alarming lack of principles and decency.

  Lucy (Bullock) is practically obsessed with a man named Peter (Peter Gallagher), to whom she's never spoken. After he slips into a coma, Lucy tells Peter's loved ones she is his fiancée, and she's welcomed into the family. Then she falls in love with his brother Jack (Bill Pullman), and things get even messier from there. The happily-ever-after of While You Were Sleeping feels like anything but. Who would want this unhinged liar as an in-law?

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