Hugh Grant's Romantic Comedy Movies: Ranked

I started working on this list sometime last year, but I didn't finish watching the other movies, so I'm unearthing this in time for Valentines Day. I was glossing over Hugh Grant’s filmography after watching a movie of his, and despite the plethora of work he has done, most of the movies I’ve seen of his were romantic comedies! He started out his career as a rom-com lead, and it’s safe to say he’s still doing it now. I don’t really see him as a typecast actor but in terms of genre he’s very much inside his comfort zone. I don’t keep track of his filmography, which leads us here. This ranking is based on my preferences (not really his performance), and unless he does more of these I don’t think the ranking is going to change. In general most of these aren’t that bad (one could probably name worse movies) but I just never really noticed him sticking to one kind of movie. There are eleven movies on this list, so this might be a long one. There are spoilers in case you haven’t seen any of these.

Movies that may fall under this list that I haven’t seen:

The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain (1995)

An Awfully Big Adventure (1995)

Nine Months

This is easily at the bottom of my list because I found it to be completely pointless. He plays a man who is in a committed relationship but isn’t ready to have children. Naturally, he freaks out when his girlfriend turns out to be pregnant. There is some character development involved because he ends up changing his mind, but I found myself not caring for any of it and wondering why I even sat through it. This also stars Julianne Moore, who wasn’t any good here. She’s not terrible, but I think she could have done more with her character.

Did You Hear About the Morgans?

Hugh Grant plays Sarah Jessica Parker’s husband, and they were in the middle of a divorce when they witnessed a murder and must go into hiding. The characters they played can be actual characters if only they had chemistry onscreen. Elisabeth Moss (she plays Parker’s assistant) is the only good thing about this movie. This also had an unrealistic time line of solving a marital problem, and didn't really solve it at all.

Music and Lyrics

I had to watch this again for the list because I could not remember any of it besides the song. This one – I guess you can say it about most romantic comedies – was a bit instant love. It’s not even the sweepy, one look kind of instant love that happens in the movies. They were just being nice to each other then suddenly they’re ‘dating’. The events happen in a span of a week and beyond writing a song together, there wasn’t anything about their personalities that would make them fit as a romantic couple. The whole ‘they’re better off with a work relationship’ argument will appear again in another movie along this list.

Mickey Blue Eyes

While this can be classified as a romantic comedy, the movie works because of Grant’s chemistry with James Caan, who plays his girlfriend’s father. This was a movie that was filled with shenanigans because his soon-to-be father-in-law belongs in the mafia. With that said, James Caan is the best thing about the movie, but I’ve ranked it higher because I enjoyed it more than the others.

Four Weddings & A Funeral

This was the last movie I watched in order to complete this list, and this disappointed me. For such a popular movie, this was very bland. Hugh Grant is charismatic, but if the supporting characters are much more interesting than the main ones, there's a problem. I did not buy the romance between Grant and Andie Macdowell; the two didn't have any chemistry at all. The script was probably the crowning glory of this piece. It took me a lot of attempts to get through this because it was unexciting. I thought this would skyrocket up the list, but I expected too much from it.

Notting Hill

This was a beloved 90’s romantic comedy but is on the bottom half of the list simply because Julia Roberts’ character was at fault for all the drama that had happened – then blamed Grant’s character for it. I think her actions could have been explained if the movie focused on her character, but the movie is in the view of the bookseller since the audience could better relate with him. This had a good soundtrack, and I really liked the bookseller character. It’s rare in movies for bookish people to be featured and not labeled as nerds.

The Rewrite

When Hugh Grant was billed alongside Marisa Tomei and the plot seems like a romantic comedy, I was hoping it was a romantic comedy. It wasn't, it leans towards a dramedy, with Tomei playing a love interest, and the romance doesn't bloom until the end. This is about a washed up screenwriter who gets a job as a teacher and learns more about himself in the process. As a dramedy, this was decent. It has a good cast line up, with J.K. Simmons and Allison Janney being in the cast as well.

Bridget Jones’s Diary: The Edge of Reason

The first time I watched this, I thought that it was a massive disaster. Years later, and it doesn’t seem so terrible. It still does follow the book, but it was a bit of a mess. It’s only ranked higher because it wasn’t much of a crash and burn as I initially thought it was.

Two Weeks Notice

Hugh Grant and Sandra Bullock have both been in their share of romantic comedies so the pairing isn’t that surprising. What surprised me however is how I was more invested in the working relationship of their characters rather than them pursuing a romantic arc. Most of the funny banter has been more of a friendship level and I think this was one of those times where the romance was injected because it is supposed to be a romantic comedy. I didn’t think they had that kind of onscreen chemistry, but I would love to see them work together on a different project that doesn’t pair them up romantically. 

Love Actually

Ensemble romantic comedies rarely work, and Love Actually was clearly an exception. I think to this day people still love it – scratch that, they do love it or else why would there be some sort of sequel? There were specific stories that I clung to, whether they be the happy or the sad kind. Some of the stories could have been edited out to make this a compact movie but other than that, this was really good.

Bridget Jones’s Diary

My love for this movie is eternal. This is one of those cases where I like the movie better than the book, and it’s partly because of the cast. Grant plays against his good guy type, opting for the debonair charmer that he plays to a tee.