It’s hardly fair to put Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield on screen together and expect the audience to not feel cross at the genetic misfortune that is the rest of us. Add in the fact they both get to use their British accents together and… swoon? So unfair.
Yes, We Live in Time stars both of these lovely people as strangers, friends, lovers, and parents through a life together. It tells its story like Christopher Nolan or Kurt Vonnegut had a baby unstuck in time. Scenes are ordered achronologically as we see them pregnant in one scene and arguing about not having kids in the next (for example).
I’m genuinely not sure what the gimmick of playing the scenes out of order was… I’m sure if you sat down and flowcharted the order of events, each scene probably informs the next. I didn’t have that luxury so I just let their lives unspool in whatever order the writer and director wanted.
And it worked, whatever their logic and reason. This is just a drama and a romance between two very likable people who go through ups and downs. The actors get to flex their considerate muscles as they play scenes of joy and tragedy. It’s honest and believable to me.
About half-way through the film, I knew I was bought in but I also knew the final estimation would come down to the inevitable atom bomb of emotion in its final scenes. Would they go for hardcore grief or would they give the audience a break and underplay the inevitable? What they chose turned out to not be the usual or expected melodramatic finale most other films of this type would go for. They chose a more humane and less soul crushing finale that probably evinced fewer tears in its hostage audience… but tears nonetheless. Much credit for bucking the expected.
Talking about the expected tear-drop factor in the film sounds like gross manipulation. And that’s a fair accusation… this isn’t the kind of film you watch for explosions and special effects (one expects Garfield and Pugh have had their fill of that). This is a film you go to for smiles, laughs, warm hugs, arguments, and sadness. If you don’t want to be manipulated into any of those emotions, this isn’t the movie for you.
Me? I loved it. It’s well written and acted and the time gimmick works in its favor, even though it could have worked without it. This is simply a lovely movie about good humans for good humans.
Score: 91