Best Romance Movies of 1996

The highest-rated romance films from 1996, ranked by MovieMagicScore based on authentic viewer ratings.

Romance 1995 Romance 1997 All Time Romance

Action Comedy Drama Horror Science Fiction Thriller Animation Documentary Fantasy Crime

Breaking the Waves

1996

In a small, conservative Scottish village, an oilman is paralyzed in an accident. His wife, who prayed for his return, feels guilty; even more, when he urges her to have sex with another.

7.5

The English Patient

1996

In the 1930s, Count Almásy is a Hungarian map maker employed by the Royal Geographical Society to chart the vast expanses of the Sahara Desert along with several other prominent explorers. As World War II unfolds, Almásy enters into a world of love, betrayal, and politics.

7.2

Comrades, Almost a Love Story

1996

Jun arrives in Hong Kong from mainland China, hoping to be able to earn enough money to marry his girlfriend back home. He meets the streetwise Qiao and they become friends. As friendship turns into love, problems develop, and although they seem meant for each other they somehow keep missing out.

7.8

Jerry Maguire

1996

Jerry Maguire used to be a typical sports agent: willing to do just about anything he could to get the biggest possible contracts for his clients, plus a nice commission for himself. Then, one day, he suddenly has second thoughts about what he's really doing. When he voices these doubts, he ends up losing his job and all of his clients, save Rod Tidwell, an egomaniacal football player.

7.0

A Summer's Tale

1996

Awaiting his girlfriend Léna’s arrival at the Breton seaside resort of Dinard, Gaspard befriends—and flirts heavily with—two other women, the companionable ethnology student Margot and the sensual townie Solène, making for a rather complicated situation when Léna finally arrives.

7.4

Beautiful Thing

1996

Set during a long, hot summer on the Thamesmead Estate in Southeast London, where three teenagers edge towards adulthood.

7.2

The Cyclone

1996

The everyday life of accountant Levante, his family and the other people of a small town in the Tuscan countryside is taken by storm by the serendipitous arrival of five gorgeous Spanish flamenco dancers.

6.9

That Thing You Do!

1996

A Pennsylvania band scores a hit in 1964 and rides the star-making machinery as long as it can, with lots of help from its manager. But behind the scenes, the group’s sudden fame tests their strength, their maturity and responsibility, and their ability to resist the temptations that money and notoriety always make possible.

6.9

Mrs. Winterbourne

1996

Connie Doyle is eighteen, pregnant and alone. She accidentally ends up on a train where she meets Hugh Winterbourne and his wife pregnant Patricia. The train wrecks and she wakes up in the hospital to find out that it's been assumed that she's Patricia. Hugh's mother takes her in and she falls in love with Hugh's brother Bill. Just when she thinks everything is going her way, her ex-boyfriend shows up.

7.2

#10

Lone Star

1996

When the skeleton of his murdered predecessor is found, Sheriff Sam Deeds unearths many other long-buried secrets in his Texas border town.

7.0

#11

Romeo + Juliet

1996

In director Baz Luhrmann's contemporary take on William Shakespeare's classic tragedy, the Montagues and Capulets have moved their ongoing feud to the sweltering suburb of Verona Beach, where Romeo and Juliet fall in love and secretly wed. Though the film is visually modern, the bard's dialogue remains.

6.8

#12

Shall We Dance?

1996

A bored accountant spots a beautiful woman in the window of a ballroom dance studio. He secretly starts taking dancing lessons to be near her, and then over time discovers how much he loves dancing. His wife, meanwhile, has hired a private detective to find out why he has started coming home late smelling of perfume.

7.3

#13

Brassed Off

1996

A Yorkshire coal mine is threatened with closure and the only hope is for the men to enter their Grimley Colliery Brass Band into a national competition. They believe they have no hope until Gloria appears carrying her Flugelhorn. At first mocked for being a woman, she soon becomes the only chance for the band to win.

7.0

#14

Big Night

1996

Primo and Secondo, two immigrant brothers, pin their hopes on a banquet honoring Louis Prima to save their struggling restaurant.

6.9

#15

Jane Eyre

1996

After a bleak childhood, Jane Eyre goes out into the world to become a governess. As she lives happily in her new position at Thornfield Hall, she meet the dark, cold, and abrupt master of the house, Mr. Rochester. Jane and her employer grow close in friendship and she soon finds herself falling in love with him. Happiness seems to have found Jane at last, but could Mr. Rochester's terrible secret be about to destroy it forever?

6.9

#16

Ridicule

1996

To get royal backing on a needed drainage project, a poor French lord must learn to play the delicate games of wit at court at Versailles.

6.9

#17

Stealing Beauty

1996

Lucy Harmon, an American teenager is arriving in the lush Tuscan countryside to be sculpted by a family friend who lives in a beautiful villa. Lucy visited there four years earlier and exchanged a kiss with an Italian boy with whom she hopes to become reacquainted.

6.7

#18

The Mirror Has Two Faces

1996

Rose Morgan, who still lives with her mother, is a professor of Romantic Literature who desperately longs for passion in her life. Gregory Larkin, a mathematics professor, has been burned by passionate relationships and longs for a sexless union based on friendship and respect.

6.7

#19

The Apartment

1996

Max is a former playboy who has decided to settle down by marrying his current love, Muriel. However, when Max catches a glimpse of the great lost love of his life, he becomes obsessed with rekindling their relationship.

6.7

#20

Beautiful Girls

1996

During a snowy winter in the small fictional town of Knight's Ridge, Massachusetts, a group of lifelong buddies hang out, drink and struggle to connect with the women who affect their decisions, dreams and desires.

6.6

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Best Romance Movies of 1996

This ranking features the top romance movies released in 1996, sorted by MovieMagicScore viewer ratings. Looking for more? Browse all genres from 1996 or see the best romance movies of all time.