20 Classic Rom-Coms Safe to Share with Your Kids
As your kids grow from children to tweens and teens, it's only natural their thoughts will turn to romance. Your kids will start experiencing crushes and maybe start dating, and this exposure to the world of love will undoubtedly lead to a sea change in cinematic preferences. The days they found the pinnacle of romance to be films like The Princess Bride and Enchanted are over. You'll need to find some romantic comedies for beginners. This means choosing films that take a more adult look at love and dating without being gratuitously raunchy. It's time to make the switch to movies made by John Hughes throughout the '80s or just about any movie starring Drew Barrymore in the '00s. Read below for some suggestions on romantic comedies appropriate for teens and tweens!
Films like 10 Things I Hate About You, Clueless, and Pretty in Pink touch on topics of concern to young adults, but do so with appropriate discretion. Of course, there are a few of naughty words spread about and sly nods to the birds and the bees. But these films manage to tackle these topics in a fashion that's still mostly appropriate for a younger audience. Keep in mind, some of these films are rated PG-13, so you may want to give them a viewing yourself before letting your kids watch. You should be able to find some films to get kids into romantic comedies that are appropriate for your kid's age and overall maturity level. As a bonus, you may find some classic films you fondly remember from your own adolescence, which you can enjoy all over again with your family!
Vote up the best romantic comedies for teens or tweens below!
- Kat Stratford (Julia Stiles) is beautiful, smart and quite abrasive to most of her fellow teens, meaning that she doesn't attract many boys. Unfortunately for her younger sister, Bianca (Larisa ...more
- Shy San Francisco teenager Mia Thermopolis (Anne Hathaway) is thrown for a loop when, from out of the blue, she learns the astonishing news that she's a real-life princess! As the heir apparent to ...more
- A fairy tale adventure about a beautiful young woman and her one true love. He must find her after a long separation and save her. They must battle the evils of the mythical kingdom of Florin to be ...more
- Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon) has it all. She wants nothing more than to be Mrs. Warner Huntington III. But there is one thing stopping him (Matthew Davis) from proposing: She is too blond. Elle ...more
- Shallow, rich and socially successful Cher (Alicia Silverstone) is at the top of her Beverly Hills high school's pecking scale. Seeing herself as a matchmaker, Cher first coaxes two teachers into ...more
- A girl who's sick of the social strictures of junior high is transformed into a grownup overnight. In this feel-good fairy tale, teenager Jenna (Christa B. Allen) wants a boyfriend, and when she's ...more
- High school hotshot Zach Siler (Freddie Prinze Jr.) is the envy of his peers. But his popularity declines sharply when his cheerleader girlfriend, Taylor (Jodi Lyn O'Keefe), leaves him for sleazy ...more
- Playboy vet Henry sets his heart on romancing Lucy, but she has short-term memory loss; she can't remember anything that happened the day before. So every morning, Henry has to woo her again. Her ...more
- Andie (Molly Ringwald) is an outcast at her Chicago high school, hanging out either with her older boss (Annie Potts), who owns the record store where she works, or her quirky classmate Duckie (Jon ...more
- On a whim, American teenager Daphne (Amanda Bynes) boards a plane to England to find the father she never met. Upon arriving there, though, she makes a startling discovery: The man she's looking for ...more
- 11Mike O'Donnell (Matthew Perry) was a high-school basketball star with a bright future, but he threw it all away to marry his girlfriend and raise their child. Almost 20 years later, Mike's marriage ...more
- Josie Geller (Drew Barrymore), a baby-faced junior copywriter at the Chicago Sun-Times, must pose as a student at her former high school to research contemporary teenage culture. With the help of her ...more
- Perennial bridesmaid Jane (Katherine Heigl) always puts the needs of others before her own, making her the go-to gal whenever someone needs help with wedding plans. So when Jane's younger sister Tess ...more
- Set in 1985, Adam Sandler plays a nice guy with a broken heart who's stuck in one of the most romantic jobs in the world, a wedding singer. He loses all hope when he is abandoned at the altar by his ...more
- Nerdy high schooler Ronald Miller (Patrick Dempsey) rescues cheerleader Cindy Mancini (Amanda Peterson) from parental punishment after she accidentally destroys her mother's designer clothes. Ronald ...more
- Everyone in the Portokalos family worries about Toula (Nia Vardalos). Still unmarried at 30 years old, she works at Dancing Zorba's, the Greek restaurant owned by her parents, Gus (Michael ...more
- Struggling boutique bookseller Kathleen Kelly (Meg Ryan) hates Joe Fox (Tom Hanks), the owner of a corporate Foxbooks chain store that just moved in across the street. When they meet online, however, ...more
- William Thacker (Hugh Grant) is a London bookstore owner whose humdrum existence is thrown into romantic turmoil when famous American actress Anna Scott (Julia Roberts) appears in his shop. A chance ...more
- In a charming, critically acclaimed tale of first love, Lloyd (John Cusack), an eternal optimist, seeks to capture the heart of Diane (Ione Skye), an unattainable high-school beauty and straight-A ...more
- School's out, and an entire graduating class -- from football stars and cool girls to complete nerds -- gathers at a wealthy classmate's home for a party. There, the artistic Preston (Ethan Embry) ...more
