We Live in Time
The already teary eyed romantic drama took off after ‘The Notebook’ but was pretty much extinguished by multiple adaptations of Nicholas Sparks’s and other writers’ novels. What John Crowley achieves with ‘We Live in Time’ is that it resembles classic four wall love stories, which one has encountered in countless movies over the years, yet it feels authentic in today’s post-COVID world, at least with these actors. It was a refreshing change in tone to see the two films that came out tonight at one of the largest auditoriums in Toronto be so sincere and sugary in the midst of the cursed nihilism of contemporary cinema. By the way, the other film was Mike Flanagan’s ‘The Life of Chuck’ and will be explored in a different review. My friend, it is a great film. These heartfelt films allowed me to rebound from my initial reservations as ‘We Live in Time’ is a film that doesn’t look away and pulls its audience’s heart strings which would normally break the film with more unqualified cast members. But fear not, Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield star in this film.
It also features quite an intentionally disorganized narration. The film begins with Pugh’s Almut receiving the unfortunate news of being diagnosed with cancer and having the difficult conversation with her partner Tobias (Garfield) where she has to choose between enjoying a great quality of life for six months or suffering through chemotherapy for a year that might not be effective in any case. From then on, the screenplay by Nick Payne follows a non linear structure depicting the relationship of Tobias & Almut in which events basically occur in four timelines. We fast forward to years later after Almut’s cancer has come back and she is battling with her urge to enroll herself in a cooking competition for the last time in her life, as many devoted cooks do. She has kept this decision to herself as well from Tobias because she knows he wouldn’t want to put any further stress on her mental or physical condition.
In the movie “We Live in Time”, we are taken back to when Tobias and Almut first met, when Almut crashed her car with him inside. With a few of these then dots connected, we learn that Almut had cancer once already, which compelled this couple, still relatively young, to the stark acceptance that they might never have children. Still, it is also clear that they did, because there are quite a number of images of a very thickly pregnant Almut, indicating the events which led up to one of the most significant birth scenes witnessed in a major film for quite some time.
A confusing story line would be a no-no to some who prefer their tearjerkers to be less complicated. Crowley and Editor Justine Wright have no title cards or any work such as a pregnant belly or a cancer patient with head shave, other than Almut’s physical body. At times these leaps appear to be random, but once one starts examining them closely, they start making sense from an emotional perspective, in the way someone thinks of highlights from their life but it is actually coming to conclusion. The script does seem to have one or two too many leaps in my opinion, and at times I wanted to spend time in one chapter of this couple for more than what the film allows, but the structural playfulness is what makes these Oscar nominees so great in the first place. How would you regard day 10 of a love story in comparison with day 100 or day 1000?
Garfield’s and Pugh’s fans will find this pretty fascinating with respect to acting as it provides such satisfaction for fans. The “Little Women” actor has to do more heavy lifting in terms of narrative, but I think it is quite remarkable that it is Garfield who steals the show as he fans out his terribly expressive face to show concern, anger and profound melancholy.
Indeed, there is barely a difference in their performances as both of them are able to transcend a storyline that is almost scripted to limit their character growth, to what both accomplish with their subtle expressions. The fact that their chemistry is undeniable also helps and so does Crowley in treating their romance like an actual romance rather than how he directed them with “no sex in movies” something social media dislikes and trends against.
There is a time in the movie when someone visually can see the trigger being pulled out of nowhere in “We live In Time”. It is not every day that two cancer diagnoses, a new baby, love blossoming and a ‘life say goodbye’ can be jammed into one film and not feel like the director is using emotional manipulation. But my guess is, these are the ones for whom the movie was made in the first place which is a hard depiction of reality. There is a reason which explains why such dramatic stories are loved and one visits hoping they have found their counterpart for a meet cute story like Almut and Tobias or are in fact hoping for it but without the car crash.
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