When it comes to love and desire, the movies have always had a powerful sway: as a mirror, as a site of fantasy, and as a perfect backdrop for date night. For Valentine’s Day this year, Film Comment Editors Clinton Krute and Devika Girish invited author Haley Mlotek and filmmaker Matthew Rankin, two highly trained experts in the parallel worlds of cinema and romance, onto the Podcast for a love-centric edition of You’re Projecting, our advice column for cinephiles. 

We call them experts for good reason: Haley’s new book No Fault: A Memoir of Romance and Divorce brilliantly captures the highs and lows of falling in and out of love, and she’s just programmed the upcoming series The Divorced Women’s Film Festival at Metrograph. Matthew’s surreal new movie, Universal Language, is all about yearning, connection, and the many forms that love can take. The group weighs in on queries, pleas, and confessions submitted by our readers and listeners, lovelorn and lovestruck alike.