Sharrock, a veteran theater director making her filmmaking debut, certainly maintains an air of sweetness throughout, and several scenes throb with unexpected resonance. The range of Claflin's character is likewise limited, with his attitude toward Lou shifting on a dime from condescending distaste to condescending affection. Clarke has a hugely expressive face, but too often she simply cycles back and forth between aggressively adorkable cutesiness and dewy-eyed pathos. Wading into such deep, complicated issues, the film quickly ends up out of its depth.īesides its inelegant way of addressing the politics of euthanasia, the film offers an admirable presentation of a disabled person as a swoon-worthy romantic lead, then allows that upside to collide awkwardly with the movie's implicit suggestion that such a life might not be worth living.Ĭlaflin and Clarke are both effortlessly appealing actors, yet neither of their performances really click. Horrified, Lou starts plotting a series of outings and luxury vacations to brighten Will's life. He has promised his mother to spend six months weighing the decision, and she hired Lou as part of a last-ditch campaign to help change his mind. However, Lou soon learns the real implications of her job: Distraught by the loss of his old lifestyle and beset by chronic pain, Will plans to end his life at a dying-with-dignity facility in Switzerland. Yet, despite her continually insane wardrobe and borderline ineptitude, Will eventually warms to Lou, hoping to expand her provincial horizons she, in turn, starts to bring a bit of genuine cheer into his sterile abode. No, as Will's imperious mother (Janet McTeer) and kindly father (Charles Dance) explain, she's there to cheer him up. The job, essentially, is to be a paid companion for Will, who now sports scraggly hair, a beard, and an arsenal of withering quips.Īs the script is a bit too quick to note, her position doesn't require her to do any of the real heavy lifting that caring for a quadriplegic demands, with bathroom and bathing duties handled by a hunky nurse (Stephen Peacocke). Heading to the unemployment office, she is assigned a lucrative temporary position at the Traynor mansion. She's burdened with a limp noodle of a boyfriend (Matthew Lewis), who ignores her to pursue his twin passions of running and entrepreneurship. Twenty-six-year-old Louisa "Lou" Clark (Clarke) has lived there all her life, helping support her large extended family as a waitress. Two years later, we find ourselves in an unnamed English country town, with Traynor castle looming in the distance. Despite his high-risk pursuits, he is horribly injured the one time he tries to play it safe: Opting against taking his motorcycle to work on a rainy morning, he is hit by a bike while crossing the street and left paralyzed. He's cast as Will Traynor, a debonair London financier from a family rich enough to own its own castle, who spends his spare time skiing, windsurfing, cliff-diving and bedding flashy women. That said, considering the popularity of Jojo Moyes' best-selling novel (she adapts her own work here) and Hollywood's bizarre reluctance to make the sort of big-hearted romantic dramas that would seem to be its most reliable date-night draws, the film ought to do well at the box office, burnishing the rising careers of stars Emilia Clarke ("Game of Thrones") and Sam Claflin ("The Hunger Games" movies).Īllthough Clarke is the clear protagonist, Claflin is the film's star. Pairing a working-class British lass with an icy, quadriplegic aristocrat whose heart she has been hired to melt, "Me Before You" would seemingly boast a can't-miss premise - class divides and medical misfortune being the peanut-butter-and-jelly of tear-jerking romance.īut Thea Sharrock's technically sound yet workmanlike direction never sells the emotional peaks and troughs the characters are alternately too exaggerated and too buttoned-down to come to life, and the final resolution pushes the film into morally provocative territory that it has neither the inclination nor the courage to confront.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |