Melodrama gets a bad wrap, even among film fans. The term is still typically used as a pejorative term indicating over-the-top acting or drama. Hopefully our coverage of All That Heaven Allows this week has shown any skeptic that melodrama can be high art—Sirk’s film is not just one of the best of this genre, but one of the best cinematic romances ever. Classic melodramas were marked by the convergence of high emotional drama, typically with a romance, and music. As characters share their first kiss the music swells, heightening the pure emotions of the screen. But melodrama is also a filmmaking style with longevity and scope. From many of the greatest silent films directed by Griffith, Chaplin, or Murnau creating the roots of melodrama to modern waves from international cinema, the genre continues to make us love and cry. These films available on streaming services are good evidence of that.

Stella Dallas [King Vidor, 1937]
Available on Amazon Prime

One of the most notable classic melodramas, Stella Dallas is a heartbreaking star vehicle for versatile actress Barbara Stanwyck. She plays the title character, a poor woman who is determined to do whatever it takes to bring her daughter up in a more stable environment. Like Phyllis Dietrichson in Double Indemnity, Stanwyck is a tough lady and a fighter, but the genre lets her be vulnerable. She finds herself in a loveless marriage and constantly ridiculed by people around her for her less sophisticated upbringing. Stella Dallas is a certifiable weepie, a beautifully sad character piece with an outstanding performance. Director Vidor isn’t talked about much anymore, but he was an incredibly important director at the turn of the sound era all the way through the 1950s—along with Stella Dallas, he made emotionally big films like War and Peace, The Crowd, and The Big Parade.

To Catch a Thief [Alfred Hitchcock, 1955]
Available on Netflix

Hitchcock is more known as a director of thrillers, but shades of melodrama run through all of his films—take the moment when the music swells and waves crash just as Scottie kisses Madeleine in Vertigo, for example. To Catch a Thief might not be the strongest example of a Hitchcock melodrama, but the thrills in the French Riviera are wonderfully romantic and stars Cary Grant and Grace Kelly are perfect together. The romantic [OK, sexual] tension between the megastars is the major attraction here; much of the film is spent begging for them to get together and when they do it is marvelous. In the film, Grant plays a former thief known as “The Cat” for his propensity to climb roofs and slip in windows to claim his prizes. Together with the surprisingly single Frances, they try to catch a new thief to clear his name. Like I said, To Catch a Thief isn’t a prototypical melodrama, but Hitchcock uses elements to elevate the thriller.

An Affair to Remember [Leo McCarey, 1957]
Available on Netflix

There might not be a more underrated director of romance than Leo McCarey, especially considering his most recognized film is the Marx Bros. classic Duck Soup. An Affair to Remember is a timeless love story that has inspired films like Sleepless in Seattle and even Linklater’s Before series. Cary Grant shows up again as a posh playboy who meets Terry [Deborah Kerr] on a transatlantic trip to New York. They quickly fall in love, vowing to return to the Empire State Building in six months, but complications keep them from their reunion. An Affair to Remember dives head first into the saccharine, but it is impossible not to root for Grant and Kerr to get together, no matter the circumstances keeping them apart.

Failan [Song Hae-sung, 2001]
Available on Amazon Prime

While melodramas have become less en vogue in the United States, that certainly isn’t the case abroad. This is especially true in South Korea, where melodrama films and television shows have become crossover hits all of the world. Failan is a devastating film that follows a Chinese woman who immigrates to South Korea searching for her only living family. To make that happen, she is set up through a matchmaking service for the equivalent of a “Green Card marriage” to Kang-jae [Choi Min-sik, of Oldboy fame in a much different performance], a low-level gangster. As they exchange letters, her idealism and love deeply affect the despicable man only in this for the fee he collects. The South Korean new wave of films is mostly known for ultra extreme action or horror—their melodrama can be recognized for having the same wild heights and Failan is among the best.

Mildred Pierce [Todd Haynes, 2011]
Available on Amazon Prime

Michael Curtiz’s 1945 Mildred Pierce is perhaps the most quintessential melodrama with the genre’s defining performance by Joan Crawford. Modern melodrama master Todd Haynes adapted the source material [novel by James M. Cain, who also wrote noir classics The Postman Always Rings Twice and Double Indemnity] to the 5-episode HBO series. Like Stella Dallas, the series involves and independent mother trying her best to care for her daughter—the relationship here, however, is much more strained, the daughter a complete spoiled brat. Mildred Pierce softens out much of the film noir style of the original film but keeps the lush and heightened emotional resonance. Haynes, of course, is perhaps best known for the Sirk tribute Far from Heaven, one of the truest translations of the classic melodrama in recent years.