The Rom-Com Formula
By Diana Campos
Many aspects of our daily lives derive from various formats we choose to follow, or, better yet, from certain formulas. How we speak and express our emotions from within to one another is all thanks to the formula we know as dialogue. When dialogue reflects the theme, it helps the audience feel connected and engaged, making them feel valued and involved: dialogue plus advancing plot plus theme reflection equals the makings of a true and great rom-com movie when you think about it. All good dialogue builds up its own momentum, getting its formulaic structure ready to be pursued just like the scientific method. We can see how the dialogue's formula directly impacts the romance oozing off the screen for us, the viewers, in our beloved rom-com films. Does dialogue have the right components and “chemical reactions” for such a great romance structure? When you break it down, dialogue makes or breaks your rom-com formula, from the buildup of the characters' romance to the passionate banter that makes us, the viewers, fall in love too. Additionally, dialogue serves as a window into characters' internal growth, revealing their evolving motivations and emotional journeys throughout the film, fostering empathy and understanding.
By Kiera Davidson
I ask myself: Is the dialogue important for maintaining the structure of the film’s main relationship and for allowing it to gravitate towards us, the viewers? Simply put, dialogue is vital; it is the essence of storytelling. It must sound naturalistic, with a consistent tempo that the viewer can follow to understand our two main characters and their budding romance. Imagine it: our characters walk into the room or a party. We’re glued to them, ready to divulge what and who they’re about, which is revealed by their spoken words and body language. That is the science of dialogue at play; it is what gravitates our attention to the person(s) of interest right on the screen. To foster a sense of trust, the dialogue should flow naturally, making viewers feel they are part of the scene. Not to say that our characters will have the same tone and pace as we do daily, but rather they perform a flow that we can easily follow from scene to scene. Every line of dialogue and body language reveals something about our character(s), from as tiny as a glimmer in their eye when they speak, to the initial contact of skin between our couple that even makes us fall in love. Every line from script to scene is a formulaic balance of realism and readability. It’s almost like dialogue is down to a science, getting down to the ebb and flow of developing movie romance.
So, if dialogue is such an important element to have within the scope of cinema, how does it specifically influence romantic tension and emotional development in the science that is romance? Well, romcoms heavily rely on dialogue to deliver witty banter, emotional conversations, and hand-twisting discussions in the realm of various movies. We have the Before trilogy films, so heavily dialogue-driven, philosophical, and oh-so-tenderhearted. We have When Harry Met Sally (1989), which is fast-paced and witty, drawing us in with their intellectual banter. We have Past Lives(2023), a romantic drama centered on dialogue that explores our characters' fates and choices. From these examples, we notice how our characters verbalize with each other, helping us develop educated guesses from their conversations. We are front and center in the experimentation with love in every line spoken between our couples. We notice that they might have something to hide from their partner, or that they have a source of pain we haven’t pieced together yet. As we move forward in their dialogue, we can hypothesize the nature or future of their relationship without lengthy exposition. With our own eyes, we see clever writing build up to motivate our characters in their quest for love. We are letting the experiment take flight with a dialogue formula to maintain the romantic tension, making viewers curious and eager to see what happens next.
We’re seeing the experiment come to fruition; we're seeing all the “data” from the romantic dates taking place. Now, we take into account the different key formula elements at play, like trivial conflicts with hints of flirty sarcasm, or even the basis of each couple's “meet-cute”. Their flow, tempo, wittiness, glimmers of their futures, all the sweet banter. It all means something to our characters' growing passions and tensions. All this “data” brings the scene to life before we, the viewers, even realize what will happen in the next scenes. Using all the data we have procured, we have delved into our characters’ backgrounds and emotions, which helps us draw our own conclusions about the scientific formula of our rom-com movies. We’re following the beat, we’re following the tension, and we’re so ingrained in it that we get so passionately involved, as if we were in the lab of creating any of these movies of romance. Language is the heart of romance when you think about it. We build, build, build on the chemistry of language to cleverly craft a formula for the public. We examined all the tropes, all the initial encounters, all the passion-baring conflicts. We’re looking at a formula for a chemistry ready to boil over, concocting a concoction of romantic elements that we can finally analyze and consume, and adore all at once.
We see the data and the formulas, and how they function to create our experiment within a rom-com movie. We see that rom-coms sell us a fantasy, an experiment to behold and present to the public within a movie theater seat. And without dialogue measuring itself as an ingredient in our rom-com film, what do we have? Sterile and lifeless characters, an experiment straight down the drain. We crave the chemical reaction of love, we yearn for the spectacle of this formula, down to a science. So, what do we, as viewers, say? Let’s get the data out, let's get that formula to the presses, and let's make more rom-com films we can devour like Valentine’s Day chocolates.
POV: You're stuck in a romcom (Love playlist)
