Serious (call it platonic or enlightened) love can be very dangerous, especially for an introverted person. It is almost impossible or at least extremely difficult to express their love. If their crush rejects them even slightly, then it hurts devastatingly. That may change them forever. They will never be the same person as they used to be.
The feelings during this platonic or first love remain pure and unprecedented, and relations with others can never give those same feelings, which will ultimately become the great nostalgia of our life.
There may be many great films about love, but this list has tried to include only those films in which generally introverted protagonists can’t express love for their crush; they can’t even speak with them and that’s why they (protagonist and crush) have minimal to almost no dialogue. These types of films are so intriguing, especially for those who have seriously fallen in love but couldn’t express their feelings, and they are still in a deep obsession about their crush.
On this list, the introverted protagonist’s love is generally one-sided. Here is the list of 15 great films.
1. A Short Film About Love (Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1988)
It is an ultimate example of one-sided love. A young boy falls in love with a woman (who may be many years older than him). How can he express his love to a woman who has her own boyfriend, and who sometimes also has sex with other men?
Her apartment room can be seen from his apartment room, so he spies on her through telescope. He watches everything that she does inside her room. He watches when she changes clothes, when she makes love with other men, when she cries, when she eats. But generally, he can’t watch her lovemaking scenes because that hurts him.
There comes a time when he speaks with her, meets with her and, of course, indirectly expresses his love toward her, but she thinks that he is attracted towards her only sensually. So how does the story develop? How does she react? How does he take her reactions? Watch it.
Kieslowski is a genius who has delved very deeply into the human psychology in all of his films. He has not only shown the love from the viewpoint of the young boy, but also from the woman.
2. Wings of Desire (Wim Wenders, 1987)
In this incredible masterpiece, Wim Wenders has chosen a wonderful love between an angel and a human woman. Angel comes to Berlin where he goes here and there and listens to the thoughts of human beings. He finds that the most people of Berlin are sad, tortured, lonely and nostalgic. At one point, he sees a gorgeous trapeze artist who is also very lonely and sad. He falls in love with her.
Now several problems are there. How can this invisible angel express his love to this human being? He chooses to be a human to feel human love. He likes to be human. But can he be? And how does that woman respond to his love? Do they even meet?
The last scene is one of the greatest romantic scenes in film history. It is Wender’s masterpiece, which is highly poetic, immensely mesmerizing and hauntingly beautiful.
3. Death in Venice (Luchino Visconti, 1971)
Our protagonist is an old composer who visits Venice to improve his health because he is dying. In Venice, he sees a strikingly beautiful adolescent boy with whom he falls in love. Now, how in the world can he express his love? He has to quench his thirst just by looking at that boy. He follows him just to look and feel satisfied. He even tries to appear younger, dyeing his hair and wearing makeup.
Visconti has made very beautiful films in his life and “Death in Venice” is one of his masterpieces. He is immensely talented in depicting the love of gay men and women. This unusual gay film is one of the most romantic films ever made. It is extremely poetic, stunningly beautiful, intensely romantic and hypnotic.
4. City Lights (Charlie Chaplin, 1931)
Which fool doesn’t know the great Charlie Chaplin? Almost all cinephiles must have seen this one. The Tramp (which can be seen in many Chaplin movies) falls in love with a blind girl. But that girl can’t recognize him, even though she also falls in love with him during one meeting. She desperately tries to meet with that Tramp but she couldn’t.
On the other hand, The Tramp also tries and wants her to know that it is him whom she is searching. Now what happens to their love? Of course, it has a happy ending like many other Chaplin movies.
Apart from their undeveloped and unexpressed love, so many funny scenes are there. It is Chaplin’s masterpiece. There is no need for further explanations for this movie since Chaplin is famous all over the world.
5. Fucking Amal (Lukas Moodysson, 1998)
Described by Ingmar Bergman as “the young master’s first masterpiece”, this film tells the story of the one-sided love of a lesbian teenage girl who is very reclusive and depressive. She can’t even make friends and how the hell can she express her love? She is notorious for her homosexuality at her school.
Almost all students make fun of her and backbite at her. She is the loneliest girl of her school. But she fall in love with a very talkative, friendly, wild, extroverted, fearless and confident girl, who is still sort of girlish as well as boyish. An important twist comes when her crush learns about her homosexuality. The crush casually kisses her just to make fun of her. Then the film becomes interesting.
This film is intensely romantic, where almost all audiences fall in love with that crush. It is not only the greatest lesbian film ever made but also one of the greatest romantic films ever made.
6. Chungking Express (Wong Kar-wai, 1994)
Wong Kar-wai should be called as the godfather of romantic films. He used two stories in his romantic masterpiece “Chungking Express”, of which the second part perfectly matches this category. The first part has some open love and romantic scenes. The second part is better both romantically, with other standards of film like music, cinematography and characters. All in all, the whole film is remarkable and an unprecedented classic of film history.
In the second part, a female snack bar owner falls in love with a cop who recently broke up with his girlfriend. She then goes to his apartment (actually she got keys from his girlfriend!), and spends time decorating and cleaning his room. She does these kinds of things frequently, which remain almost unknown to the cop. He just becomes surprised about the decoration of his room. Actually, this introverted girl can’t express her love directly, so her expression is seen in all these activities.
7. Four Nights With Anna (Jerzy Skolimowski, 2008)
After a 17-year hiatus, Jerzy Skolimowski made this film and it became a masterpiece about an unsuccessful and unexpressed one-sided love of a man. “A Short Story About Love” and “Chungking Express” meet here.
A man falls in love with a woman named Anna. Then, at night while she is sleeping, he enters her room through the window. He watches her sleep. He even polishes her nails as she sleeps, decorates her room, sleeps near her and when morning comes, he goes to his own room. He spends four nights in Anna’s room. Actually, this voyeuristic man is very introverted, antisocial and effeminate. He can’t even do anything when he sees Anna being raped. So, how does this man’s love go? That’s very interesting.
This film is very under-appreciated and unseen. It is Skolimowski’s movie that had actually made such classics like “Deep End” and “Le Depart.” This is another ultimate example of one-sided love.