I can appreciate a huge action blockbuster or a heartfelt independent arthouse film but what about the in-between films? What happened to them? These are films that don’t quite have the budget or star power of a blockbuster hit (which can cost upwards of £100 million), but perhaps have one or two A-list names attached and a smaller budget to play with. And it’s this in-between middle ground where a lot of the popular and staple romcoms used to live, especially in the late 1990s and early to mid-2000s. The mid-budget romcom followed a formula and it followed it extremely well.

The key romantic tropes would all be ticked off (the meet-cute, the falling-in-love montage, the conflict, the big romantic gesture) and they tended to cycle through various dating and romance tropes, such as the friends-to-enemies arc or the fake dating storyline. They didn’t cost too much for film studios to make, and they tended to perform relatively well at the box office – so much so that at one point, mid-budget films were Hollywood’s go-to project.

Whether it was Kate Hudson trying to one-up Matthew McConaughey in How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days or Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks being the romcom It couple in Sleepless In Seattle and You’ve Got Mail, these films were light, funny and heartwarming. They weren’t huge or glamorous blockbusters but they spoke to audiences and made us feel good.

And I embraced each and every one of them. They regularly scratch an itch for me and they’re films I go back to time and time again. I’ve probably watched The Proposal over 50 times at this point, and it still makes me weep as if I’m watching it for the first time. But the mid-budget romcom – and mid-budget films in general – had all but disappeared from cinemas until recently. Studios saw how well huge franchises and sequels did with audiences and, for the last couple of decades, they’ve invested their time and money into those projects instead. Yet, the appetite for the mid-budget romcom hasn’t gone away; if anything, it’s got even stronger.

Many films of this type have instead moved to streaming services with little to no theatrical release. But there tends to be something missing in some of these recent romcoms; they don’t quite scratch that same itch. For example, there’ll be a slightly messy script that doesn’t commit to the cheese and cringe of romance, a lack of on-screen chemistry between the leads or a bit too much realism to make it a good romcom. But despite this, I’m still glad that more romcoms are being made because, for a while, romance lovers were left with little to watch on the big screen. That these kinds of films are coming back in any way is undeniably good news.

I’d still like to see more mid-budget romcoms at the cinema. Granted, it isn’t a romcom, but I watched We Live In Time on a cinema screen surrounded by film-goers a couple of months ago and it was such a beautiful and cathartic experience. I want more of that. I want to watch two people fall in love, and I want to see it play out on the big screen with a large popcorn and a Diet Coke instead of at home on the sofa. I want the community feel of watching a film with other like-minded people at my local cinema.

Watching romcoms at home has a time and a place, of course, but I don’t want romcoms to become relegated to the bottom section of a streaming service. They deserve the spotlight too.

On a more positive note, some of these mid-budget romcoms are making a comeback of sorts. Whether you loved or loathed Anyone But You, it’s a film that not only had a theatrical release but became a ‘sleeper hit’ at the global box office. Last year, Anne Hathaway’s The Idea Of You was released on Prime Video and became the streamer’s number one romcom, and it’s likely the film would’ve done well at the box office if it had been given an initial cinematic release.

Not only do I want this returning trend to continue, but I want to see lots more romcoms in the cinema exploring all kinds of love with all kinds of people. Like sequels and franchises, the mid-budget romcom has a place in Hollywood and it’s about time it took back its rightful spot.

Image: Getty