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Me Before You poster

CAST
SAM CAFLIN
EMILIA CLARKE
JENNA COLEMAN
BRENDAN COYLE
CHARLES DANCE
VANESSA KIRBY
MATTHEW LEWIS
JANET McTEER
STEPHAN PEACOCKE

BASED ON THE NOVEL BY
JOJO MOYES

SCREENPLAY BY
JOJO MOYES

PRODUCED BY
ALISON OWEN
KAREN ROSENFELT

DIRECTED BY
THEA SHARROCK

GENRE
DRAMA
ROMANCE

RATED
AUS:PG
UK:12A
USA:PG-13

RUNNING TIME
110 MIN

ME BEFORE YOU (2016)

A positively charming performance from Emilia Clarke overcomes the squeamish moral roads taken in the romantic drama Me Before You.

These days it’s not enough for a romantic drama to be a simple tale of boy meets girl. Dementia (The Notebook), cancer (The Fault in Our Stars), and even time-travel (About Time) are some of the dilemmas star-crossed lovers of today’s big-screen face in their romantic adventures. Me Before You has a doozy all its own: euthanasia.

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It’s no surprise then that controversy has erupted over the treatment of this issue, with groups presenting the disabled especially outraged. While their protests are indeed justified (a bit more about that later), its target of discontent represents only one factor in this romantic-drama that should be judged on the development and execution of its love story, and on that criteria Me Before You succeeds.

Based on the best-selling novel written by Jojo Moyes, Me Before You stars Emilia Clarke as the eternally optimistic Lou Clark. Direly unemployed (she being the lone breadwinner of her family), Lou applies for and is hired as the personal caretaker to Will Traynor (Sam Caflin), a successful, handsome, young banker who is completely paralysed after a tragic accident.

Immediately a battle of wills begins between the two, with Lou the force of “go out there and get them!” positivity, and Will succumbed to a life of misery and anger controlled by a physical condition to allows no quarter. Yet slowly Lou breaks through Will’s barrier of negativity, and in doing so also wins the hearts and minds of the films audience who take to her infectious smile and love of stripy stockings like to a flower to the sun (corny yes, but suited to the proceedings).

Such a performance can backfire in is gaudiness (think Ansel Elgort in The Fault in Our Stars), yet Clarke makes it work in the best possible way, the personable nature in her power of positivity simply irresistible in its purity.

Clarke and Caflin’s chemistry is also on strong form, the pair providing the love in a love story where the logistics are complicated, yet the feelings passionate and tender. And that is the whole point: while physically there is limitations to this relationship, emotionally the love between the two knows no vessel.

That’s what makes its resolutions that much more disappointing. The moral dilemmas that Me Before You delve into are not in any way easy to navigate, yet the destination that the film arrives at and the icky overtly simplistic ways that is does so indeed robs the film of a third act worthy of the journey its protagonists ventured on.

Director Thea Sharrock should be commended for delivering a romantic drama with more feeling and personality that the last several Nicholas Sparks adaptations combined. Yet there is no doubt that she was shackled by a source material that betrays its main declaration to “live boldly”. As such Me Before You is a film that warms the heart, yet fails to sway the mind.

***

 

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