What Really Makes a Rom-Com a Rom-Com?

By nature, film defies the strict definitions of genre. Often, tropes exist merely to be challenged and subverted. The romantic comedy is no exception, and it may even be particularly hard to pin down because it relies on a concept so crucial to almost every kind of story: love. Even the darkest thrillers tend to have a good dose of it—Se7en is, among other things, a love story—which makes the line between romantic comedy and other adjacent genres incredibly blurry. Is Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind in the category, or is it just way, way too sad? Is the usually depressed main protagonist of normcore films like Garden State too miserable, and the love interest too quirky, to fit in the box? Perhaps a definitive definition of the romantic comedy isn’t reachable (and doesn’t need to be reached), but it seems that one thing is certain: Unlike most genres, the romantic comedy centers—and celebrates—the mystery of attraction.