Entertainment

Summer Date Movie Survival Guide

Telling the Hits from the Bombs

By Hadley Tomicki ·
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A road trip. A terminal illness. A love that dare not speak its name blossoming into a romance that only the randomness of the cosmos could have devised. Play your cards wrong and this is the summer movie you’ll see on your next date.

But there’s also Ghostbusters. And a new one from Woody Allen.

What you could be seeing on that same date.

Basically, you’ll want to peruse our Summer Date Movie Survival Guide, which lays out the ups and downs of the movies you may have to see whilst out with someone you like this summer.

Proceed with caution.

And love with abandon.

Sorry, couldn’t resist.

Date Movie: Me Before You.
CliffsNotes: Beautiful girl enlisted to help beautiful quadriplegic boy who gave up hope a long time ago. And happens to be rich. Romance blossoms. Let’s assume.
The One Redeeming Quality: Emilia Clarke, aka Daenerys Stormborn, aka Khaleesi, aka Mother of Dragons, aka the Unburnt Queen of the Andals, aka she who dominates the nickname game.
Sappiness Survival Rating: One and a half teardrops that only appear amidst tender embraces every time the music swells.

Date Movie: Love & Friendship.
CliffsNotes: An 18th-century comedy about a sharp-tongued, scandal-shrouded widow who seduces a couple of eligible bachelors.
The One Redeeming Quality: If that doesn’t sound hot already, the widow is played by Kate Beckinsale.
Sappiness Survival Rating: Four and a half ripped bodices.

Date Movie: Honeyglue.
CliffsNotes: A girl with three months to live hits the road with a cross-dressing boy.
The One Redeeming Quality: It’s only 107 minutes. So almost a full REM cycle.
Sappiness Survival Rating: Two Nicholas Sparks wannabes.

Date Movie: Careful What You Wish For.
CliffsNotes: A spurned married woman has a dangerous affair with a young guy, who is played by Nick Jonas. Let’s just stop there.
The One Redeeming Quality: It’s a thriller. So at least someone probably dies.
Sappiness Survival Rating: All five feet, seven inches of Nick Jonas.

Date Movie: Equals.
CliffsNotes: A dystopian romance about a society where no one feels emotions. It stars Kristen Stewart.
The One Redeeming Quality: Besides dystopia, Ridley Scott is one of the producers.
Sappiness Survival Rating: Three and a half cold-as-steel cyborg hearts.

Date Movie: Ghostbusters.
CliffsNotes: Ghostbusters goes 3D, with some of the funniest women alive in the starring roles.
The One Redeeming Quality: It’s Ghostbusters.
Sappiness Survival Rating: Five full best-case date-night scenarios.

Date Movie: Café Society.
CliffsNotes: Woody Allen directs a bunch of white people in this 1930s romance about a boy (Jesse Eisenberg) who falls in love with a girl (Kristen Stewart, again) in Hollywood’s golden age.
The One Redeeming Quality: Steve Carell is in here somewhere, hopefully in a return to being funny.
Sappiness Survival Rating: Three awkward Kristen Stewart half-smiles and two even more awkward Eisenberg stammers.
Hadley Tomicki

Hadley Tomicki lives in Los Angeles. He is probably going nowhere on the 10 Freeway this very second.

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