Okay this movie really annoyed me. So much so that I needed a platform to vent my frustration.
The problem / Non-problem
For someone who did not grow up in the US, mass shootings terrify me. The thought of school children walking through metal detectors, being forced to do drills in case there’s a possibility of a shooting, isn’t even something I can make peace with.
How are they trivializing mass shootings by showing fashion magazines with women holding guns, or showing a teenager being influenced by it as a fad?
The reason you wouldn’t want to marry someone who could have done these terrible things is because they are potentially psychotic, not able to manage their emotions, or there’s some dark side to them. The movie glosses over / trivializes all of it.
Lazy writing — Scene cuts, flashbacks, visual imagery isn’t going to cut it
Where’s the dialogue? Where’s the communication? Where’s the depth of emotional bonding?
I understand that when someone is given information that is gut-wrenching, you tend to become speechless as your emotions overwhelm you. Post the dinner when Charlie was given this information, I understand he couldn’t process it too well as he was in a state of shock. But even after, multiple times when he’s trying to find information to rationalize it, Emma is unhelpful to the point that she feels emotionally detached from Charlie’s mental state.
Yes, it makes sense to me that Charlie wanted to throw out all artifacts and materials that would remind him of his fiancée being a mass shooter. She doesn’t get to mock that because she seems to treat it as a non-problem since it’s all in the past, however egregious it was. So if it’s a non-problem, can you help Charlie and the audience come to the same conclusion?
Yes, Emma didn’t actually go through with it — but she wanted to do it and the reasons that she didn’t were completely circumstantial. So Charlie shouldn’t be giving her a free pass unless Emma makes him understand the whole situation. But Emma never gives much. It’s almost like: deal with it.
If she’s lived through all these years having processed her own shocking baggage, then please give us the reasons, give Charlie the reasons, and don’t make him dig up random reasons (like the neighbour dying in an accident) to justify it to himself.
Somehow, they want the audience to believe that all of this can be equated with a terribly written scene when Charlie makes out with a colleague and then stops himself. Emma is off the hook to provide any explanation once Charlie kisses a girl in a moment of rage? WHAT IN THE HELL.
Also can we have a scene where they communicate to each other like partners with an emotional bond, rather than starting over like it’s a video game? If only life and marriage were like a video game where you wake up after you die a gruesome death with a new life and pretend like nothing happened.
The artificial timeline and false sense of urgency to make a decision
If life teaches you one thing — it’s that you control the things that are in your control and leave the rest to randomness.
Pushing the wedding date was in Charlie’s control.
Yes the wedding is expensive, but if you aren’t sure about your partner then you are making an even more expensive mistake. The movie doesn’t even show Charlie considering his options — whether he could have postponed the wedding and bought some time to figure out whether Emma was the person he thought she was.
Is marriage a joke? A wedding is not just a perfunctory gesture. Marriage is a marathon. What exactly is Charlie signing up for?
Sigh.
PS: Robert Pattinson looked good and acted really well. Zendaya was okay.