16 Great Movie Romances Where They Don't Get Together In The End

Love in the time of war is a classic setup for movie tearjerkers, but Casablanca stands the test of time as one of the most romantic films ever made. Set in French-occupied Morocco during World War II, it centers on Rick (Humphrey Bogart), an American who runs a popular nightclub and offers his allegiance to no one but himself. Then his old flame Ilsa shows up. Played by Ingrid Bergman, she is a luminous, magnetic presence who unsurprisingly throws Rick’s carefully cultivated ambivalence off-kilter. She is now married to a lionized member of the French Resistance who is seeking letters that will allow them to escape the Nazi-occupied territory. Rick has to decide whether to succumb to his heart and run away with Ilsa or finally take a stand and help them escape for the war effort. 

The look of astonishment, pain, and connection that passes between Rick and Ilsa when they lock eyes for the first time since their Parisian romance ended years before offers a wealth of exposition that no dialogue or flashback could have illustrated so profoundly. The passion they carry for each other still burns brightly, and many movies would have allowed them to rush off into the sunset together. But this movie is about how the power of love can make a person relinquish their selfishness, not surrender to it. By reconnecting with Ilsa and recognizing that she has always loved him, Rick finally rises above his instinct for self-preservation and risks his life to save her and boost the Allies’ chances of winning the war. 

William Wyler’s classic 1953 romance stars Gregory Peck as Joe Bradley, a cynical journalist living in Italy who falls in love with Princess Ann (Audrey Hepburn), a sheltered heir to the throne of an unnamed European country. After arriving in Rome, the princess escapes from her royal handlers to enjoy the city, only to fall asleep on a park bench as a result of the sleeping pills her doctor has forced on her. Joe discovers her and, thinking she’s a local, takes her home to sleep off the medicine. When he sees the princess’s face in a photograph, he realizes he’s landed the greatest scoop in journalism and offers to show the young woman around Rome. 

They share a heady adventure around the bustling streets of the city. Ann (calling herself “Anya”) cuts her hair short, drives a Vespa, and eats ice cream while surrounded by happy tourists. Throughout the day, they steadily fall for each other. Joe’s cynicism is slowly unwound by Ann’s delight in the most simple pleasures, and she is charmed by his wry humor and friendly lack of deference. Government agents eventually catch up with Ann, and although she and Joe manage to escape, they know they are saying goodbye. She returns to her royal duties and he returns to his journalistic ones, but not before scrapping his intended tell-all. In the final scene, the two meet during a press conference. Ann is more regal than she was at the beginning of the movie, having finally accepted the duty inherent to her position, and Joe is respectful and contemplative. They don’t have a fairytale ending, but they are both transformed by their brief romance.

Gone With the Wind is a sweeping romance encompassing war, slavery, betrayal, and tragedy, and is more of a cautionary tale than an aspirational love story. Scarlett O’Hara (Vivien Leigh) is the beautiful and spoiled daughter of a Southern plantation owner who strikes up a romance with the devilishly handsome, unscrupulous Rhett Butler (Clark Gable). They are a perfect match for each other. She is self-centered, manipulative, and devoid of empathy. He is a serial philanderer purely out for his gain. When they meet, he tells Scarlett that he’s “no gentleman,” just as she’s “no lady.” 

During the war, Scarlett’s family loses their plantation and faces starvation while Rhett makes a fortune as a smuggler. He admires her resilience in the face of destitution, but their romance sours before they even become a couple. She spurns his advances for years, chasing another man she can’t have. By ignoring the fact that Rhett is right for her all along, she loses the opportunity to have a happy, uncomplicated life with him. When she finally realizes that he is the only person she’s ever truly loved, their relationship has destroyed everyone around them. Full of exhaustion and bitterness, Rhett leaves Scarlett to see if there is still “charm and grace” somewhere in the world.

Proving that the upper echelons of New York society in the 1870s were just as savage as the criminal underworld of the 1970s, Martin Scorsese’s The Age of Innocence follows the tortured desire between a respected lawyer played by Daniel Day-Lewis and a free-spirited divorcée played by Michelle Pfeiffer. Newland Archer (Day-Lewis) is engaged to a beautiful young socialite named May (Winona Ryder), a woman with impeccable manners who complements his social stature. But his undemanding approach to life is challenged when he becomes acquainted with Countess Olenska (Pfeiffer), a cousin who had married a European nobleman and moved overseas. Separated from her husband and living again in New York, she is an object of fascination and ostracism for her former social circle, which views her as a scandalous and dangerously free-thinking outsider. Newland, in all his repression and careful manners, is drawn to her independence. They fall passionately in love, but in a world where every inflection and gesture is mined for subtext, they are forced to hide their feelings to avoid social ruin. 

While this sounds like a setup for a decidedly un-romantic movie, it’s the opposite. Every encounter between Newland and the Countess is so charged with repressed urges that the atmosphere is electric. In one scene, he unbuttons her glove and kisses her wrist, a moment so erotic it deserves an R-rating. Though Archer daydreams about running away with the Countess, she is more realistic about their circumstances and ensures that their affair doesn’t go any further. Although their romance is never consummated, it is one of the most passionate and seductive love affairs depicted on-screen.

Adapted from the Kazuo Ishiguro novel of the same name, The Remains of the Day chronicles the near-romance in pre-World War II England between a repressed butler played by Anthony Hopkins, and a young housekeeper played by Emma Thompson. Stevens (Hopkins) is bound by the belief that serving his employer is the highest calling a man can have. He spends his days arranging silverware with geometric precision and patrolling the halls of the manor to ensure that every member of staff is performing their duty with militaristic rigor. Miss Kenton (Thompson) respects his professionalism but suspects that there is more to Stevens than servitude. Slowly and much to his discomfort, she chips away at his marble facade. In one scene, she finds him in his room reading a novel. Trying to read its title, she moves toward him in the dark until their bodies are touching. Stevens is motionless, either because he can’t bring himself to move or because he is petrified with embarrassment at the scandalously romantic book. Either way, his stillness reveals that Miss Kenton’s suspicions about his inner life are correct: There is more to him than meets the eye. 

As Stevens, Hopkins channels every emotion through his eyes and carries himself with a rigidity that signals nothing but order and discipline. Miss Kenton, by contrast, is playful and expressive. As she tries to coax him out of his professionalism, he only betrays his interest in the way he surreptitiously watches her through windows and keyholes. In his most poignant admission, he tells her, “You mean a great deal to this house,” illustrating both how deeply he feels for her and how intertwined his identity is with his career. It is this inflexibility that prevents their relationship from blossoming. Eventually, Miss Kenton marries another employee and moves away.

Before he directed the sweeping, technicolor epics like Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago, David Lean directed an intimate, black-and-white romance that offers minimal theatrics but still manages to be as powerful as any of his later films. Laura (Celia Johnson), a middle-class housewife, meets Alec (Trevor Howard), a young doctor in a train station one afternoon during her weekly trip into town. Their rapport is immediate, and they strike up a friendship as if they’d known each other for decades. Both are married with families, and when their feelings deepen into something more than platonic, they struggle to reconcile their sense of integrity with their love for each other. 

When Alec’s friend discovers their affair, the couple realizes they have too much to lose to continue their romance. Their final goodbye in the place they first met is disrupted by the appearance of one of Laura’s friends. Unable to express their feelings for each other one last time, they separate with excruciating discretion. There are no villains in Brief Encounter, and therefore no easy choices. Both Alec and Laura love their spouses and want to be loyal to them. The fact that they still succumb to their feelings demonstrates the intensity of their romance. As Laura describes it, there is nothing exhilarating or desirable about their affair: “I’ve fallen in love,” she reveals in voiceover, “I’m an ordinary woman. I didn’t think such violent things could happen to ordinary people.”