Who doesn’t love embracing their inner basic bitchiness, curling up in a cozy sweater and blanket, lighting a cozy candle, and putting on a cozy movie during the fall? (Did I mention cozy?) Apparently there are people who prefer summer, but I prefer to focus on the elite crew that know the truth, that autumn is the best season of all.
I also believe in the genuine mental health benefits of curling up in a comforting sweater, with a comforting scent, watching a movie you’ve seen a gazillion times at the end of a long day. And fall is the best time of year to achieve the maximum power of these benefits. So in that spirit, here are 10 cozy movies that you should curl up with this fall.
Mystic Pizza
Three young ladies facing the realities of young female adulthood while slinging pizza in their small-town Connecticut pizza joint? In the fall, with so much ahead of them? Screw rewatching Gilmore Girls in the fall, give me Mystic Pizza.
Stepmom
Listen, it’s not officially fall until you’ve watched the trees turn colors on Susan Sarandon’s majestic, suburban New York property, the same house where Julia Roberts tells her she’s done with her bratty daughter’s shit. “And if every time life hits her hard you wanna have some twelve-HOUR conversation every third Tuesday of the month then you go right ahead, lady, I have a life.”
You’ve Got Mail
Actually wait, no, I stand corrected. It’s not officially fall until you’ve watched You’ve Got Mail. 25 years later, it’s still a stellar romantic comedy. There’s a reason it still endures. Okay, several of them. Anywhere from its impeccable screenplay, soundtrack, or its commentary on the transition from the non-digital to the digital era, its cinematography and aesthetic is one that millennials will gladly embrace as an online personality every September and October.
Possession
The criminally underrated adaptation of A.S. Byatt’s novel of the same name sees Gwyneth Paltrow and Aaron Eckhart star as two present-day academics who stumble upon a hidden, centuries-old romance between two (fictional) Victorian poets. As they team up to investigate the mystery further, their own romantic chemistry grows. The literal embodiment of a cozy fall movie. Seek it out, you won’t be sorry.
You Can Count On Me
Remember how cute you thought Mark Ruffalo was in 13 Going on 30? Okay, so subtract five years give or take, multiply that cuteness by 20, and you’ve got him co-starring alongside Laura Linney (who received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress for her performance) as brother and sister trying to repair their broken relationship in their small hometown in Upstate New York. The scenery is a character itself in You Can Count On Me, the town of these siblings trying its best to repair the bond between them. If you’re not sold yet, I could totally picture the premise of this movie as a television series on The WB around the same year, if you need any more convincing to watch it in the fall.
Far From Heaven
The social commentary of this movie has become a bit dated (I also wrote about Far From Heaven here), but the cinematography? Chef’s kiss. Also, Julianne Moore playing a repressed, ‘50s housewife in a Connecticut town in the fall? No more need be said.
The Hours
Speaking of Julianne Moore playing repressed, ’50s housewives, she slips into a similar role in The Hours, a braided narrative of three women at different crossroads in life, bound together by their relationship to the novel Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. Nicole Kidman even took home her Best Actress Oscar for her performance as Woolf, even if her prosthetic nose overshadowed the win. I find the tone of the dialogue very calming, even if the stories themselves are a bit of a downer.
Jackie
I don’t trust any gay man who doesn’t believe that Natalie Portman should have taken home a second Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of former First Lady Jackie Kennedy in Pablo Larraín’s claustrophobic biopic Jackie. (I love Emma Stone, but La La Land was not the movie she should’ve won anything for.) That being said, I find Jackie to be a good cozy movie because it’s very internal, told entirely through Jackie’s memories of her White House years. It’s very easy to get drawn deeply into the narrative and zone out.
Spencer
As long as we’re on the topic of Pablo Larraín making claustrophobic biopics, I might as well include his Jackie follow-up, Spencer, a fable of true events starring Kristen Stewart as Princess Diana in a highly praised performance. This one actually takes place at Christmastime, but it’s in England and it’s just gray and rainy the entire time, so we’re going to qualify that as fall. Because who hasn’t felt themselves lose grip on their sanity, especially when the weather starts getting chilly, like Lady Di does in Spencer?
Practical Magic
No list of fall movies, cozy movies, or both would be complete without the Owens sisters. Also, was I the only one who was today years old when I realized Gillian’s boyfriend Jimmy is played by the same man who played Luca on ER?
What are your favorite cozy movies to watch in the fall?
Jeffrey Reads 
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