Countdown to Thirteen: One Day (2011, PG-13)

This is a time-driven film, a little bit Boyhood (although this movie shows the progression of time through changing hairstyles and whatnot rather than actually filming just one segment every year) and a little bit (500) Days of Summer.  While there’s some interest in the relationship between the leads, I don’t think the film is quite successful at what it sets out to do.

On the night of their graduation from university, Emma and Dexter very nearly have a thing.  While they don’t hook up that night, they do cement the friendship-and-maybe-more between them, and the ensuing story checks in with them every year on the same date (July 15^th) over the next two decades.  Over that time, careers rise and fall, other people move in and out of their lives, and our central duo weaves closers and farther apart from one another.

I admittedly like the hook of looking at the same day every year.  It allows for mundanity to be mixed in with the significance – on some years, July 15^th is huge for Emma and Dexter, while on others, it’s no big deal.  On some years, they’re not even in the same country, just catching up on the phone while they go about their mostly-separate lives.  We feel the effect of all the days in between that we don’t see, both in everything that changes and in everything that doesn’t.  More than once, one of them gets caught in a particular rut and several years go by without them getting out of it.

That said, the movie doesn’t wholly win me over.  Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess both do well with their roles, and they do a nice job of selling me on both the platonic and romantic poles of Emma and Dexter’s relationship, but there are aspects of the story that don’t come together for me.  There are points where the “he’s cheeky and freewheeling, she’s a bit of a stick-in-the-mud” dynamic is way too pronounced, and I don’t really like the way that, when it comes down to it, no one other than Emma or Dexter really matters.  While the film has a nice supporting cast that includes Patricia Clarkson, Tom Mison (Ichabod from Sleepy Hollow,) and Romola Garai (Bel from The Hour,) they’re all basically glorified window dressing.

The same goes for Jodie Whittaker’s Tilly.  Tilly, like Mison’s character, is a friend from university, and she flits in and out of Emma’s life (and to a much lesser extent Dexter’s) a bit throughout the film.  Early on, it seems like she’s going to be more prominent, as the second “year” features her and Emma getting a flat in London together, but she winds up being as extraneous as any other character outside the central pair.  The one place Whittaker gets much of anything to do is in an amusing comedic bit at a wedding.

Accent Watch

Northern.

Recommend?

In General – A cautious maybe.  I like what the film is trying to do, but it doesn’t quite get there.

Jodie Whittaker – Naw.  Whittaker is in it so little and has so little to do.

Warnings

Language, drinking/smoking/drug use, sexual content, brief violence, and thematic elements.