"Falling in Love" Montage

When did you last let your heart decide?

"Let's make this moment be the symbol of our lives We'll pawn your dad's computer and we'll sail to paradise You're a girl... or maybe a wagon... filled up with pancakes..." —Strong Bad falls in love, Homestar Runner

Variant of the Good Times Montage. Two characters are becoming romantically entwined. Their first date is shown normally and the audience is shown how amazingly compatible the couple is.

A montage follows, usually with no dialogue and an upbeat or romantic soundtrack, showing the couple during a series of classic dates (the picnic, the carnival, the unexpected kiss, the meaningful eye contact, The Meadow Run, etc).

The montage segues into the end of a date and the audience is shown just how in love the couple has become.

In TV shows, this is often a Time Compression Montage serving to show how, in this episode, the Girl of the Week isn't just a casual fling.

See Literally Falling in Love for a Sub-Trope. Contrast with Lost Love Montage.

Examples of "Falling in Love" Montage include:

Anime and Manga

• Played out as a Parody, satirized by commentor Kyon in episode 00 "The Adventures Of Mikuru Asahina" of The Melancholy Of Haruhi Suzumiya, just like so many other tropes.
• Cardcaptor Sakura: While he was showing hints here and there, Ki Ni Naru Aitsu was the definitive Falling in Love Montage (if only one-sided) for Syaoran.
• Code Geass does this with Suzaku and Euphemia in episode 5, though their conversation plays while showing them walking around the city after their Meet Cute.

Comic Books

• Between Sistah Spooky and Mindf*** in Empowered. And shortly after, how they fall apart. And BTW, Mindf*** is a girl... a blonde girl.

Film

• Played for Laughs in The Naked Gun when Frank Drebin has a date with Jane Spencer. To the tune of "I'm Into Something Good," they have the typical dating montage, including a beach scene with them holding hands, running, and clotheslining another couple running the other way.
• Played extremely straight in the Korean romantic comedy My Sassy Girl and its spiritual prequel Windstruck.
• Played completely straight in Crazy/Beautiful. The chapter on the DVD was even called "Falling in Love"
• Parodied in Mel Brooks' Silent Movie, where the individual scenes of Mel and his girlfriend each turn absurd (they're riding a carousel together and then the carousel horse starts pooping blocks of wood; a frolic in the park turns into a race, complete with hurdles and a finish line; and so on).
• Arguably, the "This Is My Idea" musical number from The Swan Princess. It starts out with the two main characters being introduced to each other as children, both of them despising the other upon sight, and goes on to show them growing up, eventually falling in love. All the while their respective parents and kingdoms sing about how their arranged marriage is so perfect...especially as it could result in lower taxes!
• The hastily produced Vanilla Ice movie Cool As Ice has one of these over one of Ice's ballads.
• Given that it's a parody of James Bond, Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery plays this fairly straight as Austin treats Vanessa Kensington to a night on the town.
• Used in the Disney Animated Canon film Beauty and the Beast, against the song of "Something There", which tends to confuse fans as to just how long Belle lives in the castle.
  • Interestingly, the Cut Song "Human Again" originally slated for this part of the film was much more specific about the passing of winter, but was dropped in part because the filmmakers were worried the audience would start wondering what Maurice and Gaston were doing all this time. They never quite solved this problem, even when the song was reinstated in the stage musical and a reedit of the film.
• And while we're on the subject of the Disney Animated Canon...
  • The song "Strangers Like Me" from Tarzan is a combination montage of both his falling deeper in love with Jane and his learning about humanity.
  • "Bella Notte" from Lady and the Tramp starts as a typical onscreen song but then transforms into a romantic montage that spans the course of the evening. (Then it fades to black, and then fades back up to the titular characters waking up on the same hill. And she's pregnant later. Hmmmm.)
  • The sequel has a similar montage focused on Scamp and Angel, to the song "Can This Be Love?"
  • "I Bring You a Song" from Bambi. Not your typical romantic montage, as the mood is actually quite somber and it focuses a lot on the nature around the two deer falling in love.
  • "Caaaaaan you feel the looooove tonight?"
    • "Upendi" from the sequel.
  • Before "Kiss the Girl" even hits the screen there's a love montage between Ariel and Eric touring the kingdom.
  • "Life is brief, but when it's gone, love goes on and on..."
  • The Princess and the Frog has a variation - while the montage is definetly one of these for Tiana and Naveen, the song itself (Ma Belle Evangeline) is about Ray's love for Evangeline.
  • Invoked in Cinderella by the king who wants grandkids. He sets up the perfect romantic scene and the Duke is describing how it would be.

Duke: Such a pretty picture, but in Real Life, doomed for failure. The King: Failure eh?! Take a look at that you pompous windbag!

• • The song "A Whole New World" from Aladdin.
  • "Colors of the Wind" from Pocahontas.
  • The scene where Rapunzel and Flynn first arrive at Corona in Tangled, followed by a scene reminiscent of the "Tour of the Kingdom" sequence from The Little Mermaid and the song "I See the Light".
• James Bond (George Lazenby) has one in On Her Majesty's Secret Service with Tracy (Diana Rigg), set to Louis Armstrong singing "We Have All the Time in the World."
• The montage in Saved! is a cross between this and the Lost Love Montage - the characters shown are all in love with people that are unavailable or estranged.
• Subverted in The Break-Up, which opens with a Meet Cute, followed by one of these to You're My Best Friend, followed immediately by...well, I think you can figure this one out on your own.
• Seen in Walk Hard: The Legend of Dewey Cox between Dewey and Darlene. As it happens, their montage includes such questionable activities as licking, sucking, slurping ice-cream cones with very ambiguous expressions...
  • Not to mention the highly suggestive carpentry.
• The beginning of the Pixar film Up has one where Carl falls in love with and marries Ellie... and it results in severe Mood Whiplash since Carl is a widower by the time the plot starts.
• Madea's Family Reunion has this with Vanessa and Frankie, and an inversion with Lisa and her abusive husband Carlos showing him abusing her.
• Once Lalita and Darcy got out for dinner in Los Angeles in Bride and Prejudice they really start to click.
• Eowyn and Faramir's relationship in the Lord of the Rings films is cut down to this to save time. And it only appears in the Extended Edition!
• Parodied in Hot Shots. One scene shows Topper and Ramada laughing and smiling as they exit a movie theater. The camera then pans up to the marquee to reveal that they had just finished watching the very depressing Platoon.

Live Action TV

• The romantic comedy Adam and Steve shows a rare instance of a same sex couple having a Falling In Love Montage.
• Like several other montage types, this is deconstructed for horror effect in Doctor Who, "Forest of the Dead", in which we see Donna undergo a "Falling in Love" Montage only to find out that it actually happened that fast, taking place in a virtual reality world which relies on the human brain mentally filling in the extra time to avoid confronting the constant disorientation.
• Parodied with Geraldine and Simon Horton in The Vicar of Dibley, with scenes including a romantic picnic in which she stuffs an entire chocolate bar into her mouth and, most famously, a scene of them laughing and jumping in puddles which ends when one turns out to be about a meter deep.
• Mission Impossible intentionally avoided montages, but did use this type in a couple of episodes. One case, in "The Short-Tail Spy," was quite creative: it used a quick series of various locations and activities, but included dialogue that ran together to form a single, coherent conversation between the two characters.
• Parodied in the Blackadder II episode "Bells", where a "Falling in Love" Montage of Edmund and "Bob" turns into a commercial for an album of Elizabethan love songs.

Scrolling subtitle: Greensleeves... The Rain It Raineth Every Day... Hey Nonny I Love You... My Love is a Prick (on a Tudor Rose)... Hot Sex Madrigal in the Middle of My Tights

• Parodied and lampshaded on Wizards of Waverly Place during Alex and Mason's first date.
• The Community episode "Origins of Vampire Mythology" has a pseudo-Falling In Love montage between Pierce and Chang after they try to become best friends. Then they get in a fight and there's a Lost Love Montage. Five minutes later.
• Used hilariously as Tom both falls in love with Allison and teaches her how to kill vampires, all in the same montage, in Being Human.

Web Animation

• Spoofed by Homestar Runner in the Strong Bad Email montage, where one of the montages created is one of Strong Bad falling in love with a Wagon Fulla Pancakes.

Web Comics

• Kat and Alistair on this page of Gunnerkrigg Court.
• Bug deconstructs this.
• In Homestuck, Karkat has a falling-in-hate montage with John. Of course, since humans don't work that way, it ends up going nowhere, much to Karkat's annoyance.

Web Original

• The number one cliche NOT in He's Just Not That Into You.
• Occurs in episode 8 Romantic False Lead of Echo Chamber.

Western Animation

• They do this twice in Danny Phantom with Danny and Sam's date respectfully. Averted because neither end up with their girl/boyfriend by end, the former being the Dating Catwoman variation and the latter a faker who was only a Gothic dreamboat Hungarian in an attempt to get down Sam's pants. Predictably, both Danny and Sam ended up together by end.
• This is played unusually straight in Futurama in Bender's Big Score, to show Lars and Leela falling more and more in love. Admittedly as it is Futurama, they play space golf and go floating in real giant bubbles, but apart from that, it's straight.
  • And then there was Bender and Angeline.
  • There's also Bender and the Planet Express Ship, who fall in love to Bender's rendition of "Daisy Bell" in "Love and Rocket." This is a slight inversion, though, because in the scene immediately following the montage, Bender announces that he's dumping the ship.
• Mickey and Minnie share a romantic montage in Mickey, Donald, Goofy: The Three Musketeers. * Snort* As if we didn't already know where that was going.
• A lampshade was hung on this in an episode of Chilly Beach: "Would you like to have a romantic montage with me?
• The Batman features a Evil version for The Joker and Harley Quinn, where they she not only falls in love, but they destroy most of Gotham in the process. Set to the Joker singing Hank Williams', "Settin' The Woods On Fire. And it is awesome.
• Dr. Doofenshmirtz and his (unnamed) evil girlfriend share one of these in the Phineas and Ferb episode "Chez Platypus" only to have it jerked away right before the episode ends.

Doofenshmirtz: I found my other half, yes, I got an evil love!

• In Happy Tree Friends, Handy and Petunia get one of these in I Nub You. This being Happy Tree Friends, however, it ends abruptly. And gruesomely.
• Parodied in The Penguins of Madagascar after Skipper and a peregrine falcon fall in love. The song is particularly funny given that Skipper's favorite pastime is covert ops and the falcon's favorite pastime is the horrific murder and consumption of smaller birds and "delicious little furry animals."

It'll be a week to remember, as long as no one's dismembered.

• • The sequence with Julien and Rico blowing up everything in sight in the park during "Kaboom and Kabust" plays out very much like one of these.
• In Jimmy Two-Shoes, one happens between Beezy and Saffi.
• Subverted and then ...not in Hey Arnold where Arnold goes through a seemingly bland montage of dating Lila, not enjoying it at all, however later on when thinking back on it he remembers the fun that the previous montage didn't show the audiences, realizing he'd fallen in love with her.

Arnold: "Aw, no... this can't be happening. I think I actually... like her like her."

• In The Looney Tunes Show, Bugs and Lola have one of these in Paris after he finally gets her to stop talking. At the end...

Lola: Yeah, no, that whole thing would have been a loooot more better with talking.

• In Recess, Miss Finster has one of these with Hank, the janitor, after the main six hook them up.
  • Including the infamous scene of her riding a vibrating floor buffer, laughing.