LOVE, ROSIE: 2 ½ STARS. “an amiable, sit-com-turned-rom com.”
Or a movie about teen pregnancy, failed expectations and missed opportunities, “Love, Rosie” has a pretty cheery outlook. Based on the bestselling 2004 novel “Where Rainbows End” by Irish author Cecelia Ahern it stars Lily Collins as the title character, a young woman in love with her best friend.
From the age of five Rosie and Alex (Sam Claflin) were inseparable. Best of friends, their relationship flowered, bordering on romantic, until at age 17 he moves from Dublin to Boston to attend school. Her plans to move to the States to be with him are scuttled when she finds herself unexpectedly pregnant. Like star-crossed almost lovers, their paths are intertwined over the next twelve years, as Rosie plays single mom to her daughter while Alex’s seemingly perfect life has one major romantic deficit.
Imagine an Irish “When Harry Met Sally” rehash without the diner orgasm scene and you are on the way to understanding “Love, Rosie.” It builds on the question of male, female friendship—Is it possible or does sex always get in the way?—in the most predictable of ways, but is buoyed by its two lead female performances.
Lily Collins is undeniably charming as the fetching Rosie, a headstrong woman who knows exactly what she wants unless it has anything to do with love. She has gumption and Collins plays off her determination to amp up the humorous aspects of the story, although a sequence involving handcuffs, a bedframe and Rosie’s daughter’s morning routine seems airlifted in from another, sillier movie.
As Ruby, Rosie’s plucky best girlfriend, Jaime Winstone has more chemistry with Collins than lead actor Sam Claflin can muster. The central relationship in the story should be between Rosie and Alex, but Claflin is too bland a romantic lead to register or make us care about the brewing romance between the two. Love may be in the air, but it is not on the film.
In Canada “Love, Rosie” will be released day and date in theatres and on Video on Demand. The latter, small screen experience feels like the best way to see this amiable, sit com-turned-rom com.