Best Romance Movies of 1981

In the midst of a searing Florida heat wave, a woman convinces her lover, a small-town lawyer, to murder her rich husband.

An account of the revolutionary years of the legendary American journalist John Reed, who shared his adventurous professional life with his radical commitment to the socialist revolution in Russia, his dream of spreading its principles among the members of the American working class, and his troubled romantic relationship with the writer Louise Bryant.

Great Britain, 1944, during World War II. Relentlessly pursued by several MI5 agents, Henry Faber the Needle, a ruthless German spy in possession of vital information about D-Day, takes refuge on Storm Island, an inhospitable, sparsely inhabited island off the coast of northern Scotland.

Megan Carter is a reporter duped into running an untrue story on Michael Gallagher, a suspected racketeer. He has an alibi for the time his crime was allegedly committed—but it involves an innocent party. When he tells Carter the truth and the newspaper runs it, tragedy follows, forcing Carter to face up to the responsibilities of her job when she is confronted by Gallagher.

Arthur is a 30-year-old child who will inherit $750 million if he complies with his family's demands and marries the woman of their choosing.

In this story-within-a-story, Anna is an actress starring opposite Mike in a period piece about the forbidden love between their respective characters, Sarah and Charles. Both actors are involved in serious relationships, but the passionate nature of the script leads to an off-camera love affair as well. While attempting to maintain their composure and professionalism, Anna and Mike struggle to come to terms with their infidelity.

The sensuous wife of a lunch wagon proprietor and a rootless drifter begin a sordidly steamy affair and conspire to murder her Greek husband.

A young immigrant comes to America in the 60s and is caught up in the counterculture movement which tests his bonds of friendship and love.

A film editor breaks up with his girlfriend, unsure if he is in love.

Teenage knucklehead Gregory falls hard for Dorothy, a hotshot female player who takes his spot on the boys’ school soccer team. Prodded by the advice of his smart-mouthed 10-year-old sister, Gregory does make his move, but there’s behind the scenes feminine conspiracies en route.

When Barbara Scott's husband leaves her, blaming her frigidity for destroying their marriage, she's left alone, without a source of income, and charged with taking care of their teenage son, Paul. Feeling vulnerable, she turns to her friend Gina who opens Barbara's eyes to the secret world of suburban swingers. But as erotic tension grows, Barbara begins to fantasize about her handsome son...

Three middle-aged wealthy couples take vacations together in Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter. Along the way we are treated to mid-life, marital, parental and other crises.

King Leontes of Bohemia suspects his wife, Hermione, and his friend, Polixenes, of betraying him. When he forces Polixenes to flee for his life, Leontes sets in motion a chain of events that lead to death, a ferocious bear, an infant left in the snow, young love, and a statue coming to life.

During the Great Depression, a sheet music salesman seeks to escape his dreary life through popular music and a love affair with an innocent school teacher.

Two young kids fall in love with each other. But the passion is too consuming for the parents of Jade. The parents try to stop them from seeing each other. But when this doesn't work, David burns down the house and is sent away. This doesn't stop him from seeing her. When he gets out he goes to look for her. But the passion for his first love is too strong and she has to leave.

A hard-nosed Chicago journalist has an unlikely love affair with an eagle researcher.

A two-bit promoter tries to take a women's wrestling team to the top.

George Hamilton stars in a dueling dual role as twin sons of the legendary Zorro. Soon after the dashing Don Diego Vega inherits his father's famous sword and costume, a broken ankle prevents the masked avenger from fulfilling his heroic duties. When his flamboyantly fashion-conscious brother assumes the secret identity to continue an ongoing fight for justice, the results are nothing short of hilarious!

Helena loves Bertram, but he's of noble birth, while she's just a doctor's daughter. But Bertram is at the court of the King of France, who is ill, and Helena has a remedy that might cure him and win her the right to marry Bertram. But does Bertram want to marry her?

New York's Odyssey Detective Agency is hired by two different clients to follow two women suspected of infidelity. Ladies' man John Russo trails Angela Niotes, the elegant wife of a wealthy Italian industrialist, while Charles Rutledge and Arthur Brodsky follow Dolores Martin, the beautiful young wife of a jealous husband. Their respective cases are complicated when John falls for Angela, and Charles falls for Dolores.

In Berlin in 1961, an American soldier and a German engineer join forces to build a tunnel under the Berlin Wall in order to smuggle out refugees, including the soldier's East German girlfriend.

A wealthy playboy, seeking the ultimate sexual experience, ends up meeting Madame Lau, an exotic oriental temptress endowed with mystical powers. She promises him that he will find the gratification he seeks.

Featuring Speedway World Champion Bruce Penhall, Brad Lackey, Bob Hannah, Kenny Roberts. World Champion Bruce Penhall is only one of the racing luminaries profiled in this motorcyclist’s cinematic bible. Thrill to the pulsating sound of high powered cycles in the desert, on the road, and tracks around the world. On Any Sunday II features interview and championship races with Brad Lackey, Bob Hannah, Kenny Roberts, and, of course, Penhall.

An Arab oil organization devises a plan to wreck the world economy in order to cause anarchy and chaos.

Phillip Filmore is a naive, 15-year-old, preoccupied with sex, who develops a crush on Nicole Mallow, the new 30-something, French housekeeper and sitter to look after him when Phillip's father is out of town for the summer on a "business" trip. But Mr. Filmore's unscrupulous chauffeur, Lester Lewis, takes advantage of Phillip's crush on Nicole to hire her to seduce the youth, then draws her into a plot to fake her own death in a blackmail scheme aimed to drain Phillip's trust fund.

Henri Pachard like Louis Malle is a gifted, prolific, visionary film-maker, Pachard's films idolize women, and skillfully educate the most sophisticated viewer of eroticism (both male and female) with exquisite, and mesmerizing "true to life" encounters.

Jealous, harried air traffic controller Max Fielder, recently dumped by his girlfriend, comes into contact with nuclear waste and is granted the power of telekinesis, which he uses to not only win her back, but to gain a little revenge.

A film adaptation of D.H. Lawrence's novel. After a crippling injury leaves her husband impotent, Lady Chatterly is torn between her love for her husband and her physical desires. With her husband's consent, she seeks out other means of fulfilling her needs.

When the young Texas Ranger, John Reid, is the sole survivor of an ambush arranged by the militaristic outlaw leader, Butch Cavendich, he is rescued by an old childhood Comanche friend, Tonto. When he recovers from his wounds, he dedicates his life to fighting the evil that Cavendich represents. To this end, John Reid becomes the great masked western hero, The Lone Ranger. With the help of Tonto, the pair go to rescue President Grant when Cavendich takes him hostage.

When two mysterious deaths mar an otherwise pleasant weekend in the English countryside, unflappable flapper Lady Eileen Brent teams up with the dashing Jimmy Thesinger to solve the dastardly deeds. Their sleuthing leads them into a world of espionage and international intrigue as they discover a secret society known as "The Seven Dials" and the attempted theft of top-secret government documents.

Octavius Caesar (later renamed Augustus Caesar, son of the murdered Julius Caesar), Marc Antony, and Lepidus form the triumvirate, the three rulers of the Roman Empire. Antony, though married to Fulvia, spends his time in Egypt, living a life of decadence and conducting an affair with Queen Cleopatra. In Antony's absence, Caesar and Lepidus worry about Pompey's increasing strength.

A prostitute and a drifter find themselves bound together as they make their way through the rural South, doing what they have to do to survive.

Two best friends couldn't be more different; Jack is a smooth-talking ladies man, while Lenny is anything but. But when Lenny meets Karen, it threatens to change the dynamic of their friendship.

Hoodwink is based on the true story of an Australian con artist who briefly won the hearts of the media (if not the authorities). John Hargreaves stars as a criminal serving time in a New South Wales prison. He's not partial to the physical labor required of the convicts, so he hits upon a labor-saving plan. Hargreaves pretends to be totally blind, thus lightening his work load....and carries off the hoax for years.

When a womanizing bookshop owner hears about the suicide of a former girlfriend, he tries to find out more and meets her friend, a prostitute. They hook up, but when she finds her friend's diary, she discovers she's repeating her mistakes.

Lester is a homeless shoeshine boy living in a railway station. He's got this funny knack for picking the winning horses' names out of the paper while shining shoes. When word gets around, though, everyone wants a piece of the action.

Following the banning and burning of his novel, "The Rainbow," D.H. Lawrence and his wife, Frieda, move to the United States, and then to Mexico. When Lawrence contracts tuberculosis, they return to England for a short time, then to Italy, where Lawrence writes "Lady Chatterley's Lover."

Charli is a film for lovers. It is the story that every man and every woman who have ever truly been in or out of love will identify with. Instinctively conceived and sensitively produced, Jesie St. James and Eric Edwards play a married couple whose marriage is on the rocks. They keep the fires burning within as they fantasize about making love to those around them. Charli is a love story, a real SEXY love story.

He wanted adventure...She craved revenge...Emeralds held the answer.

A romantic tragedy about two turn-of-the-century couples - one American, one British - who regularly vacation together at a spa in Germany.

Two domestic robots fall in love and run off together.

A junior executive is ordered to boost output in the hometown brewery where his old friends work.

Ambitious young Jodie wants more out of life than the small Texas country town she lives in has to offer. Jodie realizes that in order to pursue her dreams she will have to leave Texas and move to the big city. However, her shiftless factory worker boyfriend Kyle wants to stay in Texas.

An old man lives out the final years of his half-century marriage by living and remembering.

A porn-based retelling of Beauty and the Beast. Beauty's Father loses gambling to Martin Gross, and will lose his fortune unless Beauty goes to live in the Gross household for a year.

A young American hockey player, studying in Canada on a hockey scholarship, falls in love while risking his scholarship and the prospect of the Vietnam war draft.

A re-enactment of the trial of the mistress of the Scarsdale Diet doctor for his March 1980 murder, with excerpts from the transcript of the proceedings serving as the script.

TV movie 1981 Vacationing Georgia construction worker (John Schneider) meets and falls for Manhattan's comely Director of Urban Renewal (Marilu Henner) and despite her initial rejection of him, sets out to build a dream house for both of them.

In one of many unpopular and unsupported policy decisions, the US government of the near future outlaws vehicle petrol in an effort to curb the overuse of limited natural resources - except, of course, for official purposes. There are many renegades who oppose the authorities, and will stop at nothing to allow themselves the freedom of burning around the countryside.