2025 is moving at a quick pace, and February is already here. Of course, that means the arrival of Valentine’s Day, either the most romantic day of the year or the most manufactured one. No matter which camp you’re in, February is undeniably the month of love and romance, meaning you’re bound to be in the mood for either a sweet rom-com or the opposite of that sooner or later.
If you’ve seen all the popular options and are looking for more under-the-radar options, look no further than the three options on this list. These movies are underappreciated by mainstream audiences. However, they are perfect options to celebrate Valentine’s Day. They’re funny, romantic, and even a little subversive. What’s not to love about them?
Jack Quaid and Maya Erskine star in the sweet, predictable, but ultimately effective 2019 rom-com Plus One. The film centers on two longtime friends, Ben (Quaid) and Alice (Erskine), who agree to be each other’s plus-ones at the numerous weddings they have to attend. However, they will soon realize they might mean more to each other than they previously believed.
Plus One doesn’t really reinvent the rom-com formula. On the contrary, it sticks the landing, following the many familiar beats and tropes fans have come to expect from the genre. However, that’s exactly where its greatest strengths lie. Plus One is a pretty perfect romantic comedy that will satisfy those looking for a film to celebrate Valentine’s Day. Quaid and Erskine have excellent chemistry, and the screenplay brings out the best of their performing strengths.
Plus One is available to stream on The Roku Channel.
One of the best Hulu original movies, Good Luck to You, Leo Grande is the all-too-rare sex romantic dramedy for adults. Two-time Oscar winner Emma Thompson delivers one of her most vulnerable performances as Susan, a middle-aged woman who hires a sex worker, Leo Grande (Daryl McCormack), to explore pleasurable sex for the first time in her life.
Good Luck to You, Leo Grande thrives on the strength of Thompson and McCormack’s performances. The actors have true chemistry together, allowing for an intimate and insightful exploration of intimacy, sexuality, and the true meaning of pleasure. The film is as sharp as it’s tender, inviting a frank and refreshingly direct discussion to prove that self-discovery stories never go out of style, especially when told with such wit, grace, and empathy.
Good Luck to You, Leo Grande is available to stream on Hulu.
Two-time Oscar winner Renée Zellweger and the somehow never-nominated Ewan McGregor star in Peyton Reed’s criminally underrated 2003 rom-com Down with Love. A pastiche and homage to ’60s no-sex comedies, especially those starring Rock Hudson and Doris Day, Down with Love follows Catcher Block (McGregor), a renowned womanizer who pretends to be someone else to seduce Barbara Novak (Zellweger), a staunch feminist and best-selling author.
Funny, charming, occasionally biting, and deliciously subversive, Down with Love is a truly one-of-a-kind movie, at least in terms of modern rom-coms. Sure, it is wholly indebted to the movies it both parodies and celebrates, but it comes with a unique and distinct modern touch, a “wink, wink” to the audience. Zellweger and McGregor are great together, as are supporting players Sarah Paulson and David Hyde Pierce. Plus, the fashion is to die.
Down with Love is available to stream on Amazon.
Some of the best shots in Grok Imagine’s AI-made Odyssey don’t contain actors. Ancient landscapes stretch into the distance. Close-ups of grimy hands suggest people who have touched something rougher than a keyboard. For a few seconds, the illusion holds.
https://twitter.com/imagine/status/2113712964419063911
YouTube videos could soon look better without eating quite so much data, right? Thankfully, the platform plans to introduce a new video format called AV2 on its web player in early 2027, promising more efficient streaming and potentially fewer playback hiccups on slower internet connections. The big headline is a roughly 30% improvement in compression efficiency over AV1, YouTube's existing video format. That doesn't guarantee every video will use 30% less data, but it could make streaming a little easier on both internet connections and data allowances.
What is AV2, and why should viewers care?
YouTube is changing how its Home page works, giving viewers more control over what shows up there and making some of the app’s most-used sections easier to reach. Custom Feeds are now replacing the existing topic chips for eligible users, while YouTube is also testing a redesigned top bar on mobile that moves Subscriptions closer to the Home feed.
YouTube first started experimenting with Custom Feeds earlier this year, letting you type out what you wanted to watch and turning that request into its own stream of recommendations. Now, the feature is starting to look less like a side experiment and more like something YouTube actually wants people to use as part of their everyday Home page.