The romcom isn’t dead, but maybe it should be. Hear me out. Most romance plots in films and TV involve a person not being able to give up on another person.
That isn’t romance. That’s stalking.
You can sugar-coat it all you want, but if somebody says, “WANT!” and the other person doesn’t agree with the same amount of force, you kinda have a problem. This is, in fact, the very plot of many romcoms. Except the problem is always getting the parties on the same level of desire, rather than the acknowledgment that this is imbalanced sexual politics … and it’s not a good look no matter how much the screenplay needs us to like both parties. I wrote those words before the Cornell 7 came to light; now I’m never going to give up this POV.
Which brings us to today’s film, Finding Emily.
Owen (Spike Fearn, which is a great name for a botanist) is a Sound Engineer. Don’t get all hot ‘n’ bothered; that just means he plugs in shit at nightclubs. One night while doing his job, he meets a local college student, and these two really hit it off.
Hey, good for you guys.
The problem is neither of these chuckleheads had presence of mind to foresee a time when they wouldn’t be together, as sometimes happens when you fall in love without thinking … or any brain activity at all for that matter. “Fairy Emily” (Sadie Soverall) is dragged out of the club by friends before Owen catches her name. Hey, wasn’t Owen supposed to be working? Yeah, he did a TON of work that night, all right. Realizing his mistake, Owen rushes out to find her and in the ensuing shouting match, he collects “Emily.” She even puts her digits in his phone.
The following morning, of course, Owen discovers the phone number is incomplete; his texts are going nowhere, and the girl of his dreams has vanished without a trace. I state this as a CIS male: the film should end right here. Yes, this could have been, and probably is, a case of carelessness or stupidity on the part of the girl. However, in the 21st Century of modern romance, the guy has to err on the side of “this isn’t a mistake” even if it is. Because the alternative is wrong.
They don’t make movies about common sense or proper behavior, do they? Naturally, Owen scours the college looking for his “Emily.” He gets a lead, but Emily Raine (Angourie Rice) is not the girl he chatted up at a club last night. Emily Raine, is, however, a grad student with a thesis about romance itself being a product of immaturity and a tool of predatory behavior (boy, is it ever). Her testable thesis is that all romantic pursuits are forms of self-sabotage. Struggling with a case study, however, she chooses Owen and agrees to assist his pursuit of his missing subject of desire so that -ultimately- she can affirm her thesis and get a degree.
And if you don’t see where this is going, I envy you; you’re obviously new to the genre.
While wearing the face of an innocent waif, Owen does indeed engage in some predatory behavior, including blanket emails to every.single.Emily in the college (over 300!) to find his person. This is where the film kinda hedges for me. It wants to pretend that Owen exists only for another smile, but such seems most disingenuous given the lengths he goes to find “Emily.” And the fact that he lets his story be known in public -for good or bad- without immediately stopping tells me all I need to know. Director Alicia McDonald, you are fudging on his innocence.
That said, I did like Owen and every Emily we met. I also liked the questions the film raised: What is the evolutionary advantage of romanticism? Is there one? We like romance. Romance is fun and gives you a special high, but is there any real
biological advantage to being romantic? Does it naturally lead to greater species propagation? Maybe. Maybe not.
How would we feel about the reverse: “Finding Owen” a film about a girl named Emily who hits it off well with a guy, but then finds he’s disappeared without a trace and the number she has is faulty. That doesn’t even sound like a romcom to me; that sounds like a thriller, no? And why is that? And, in the very least, what is the definition of stalking? I.e. How do you know when your subject has crossed a line? I’d guess that when you’ve got an entire student body pissed at you, it’s time to be quiet and disappear for a while, no?
Obviously, I’m of mixed feelings on Finding Emily. I’m giving it a thumbs up, with a caveat that whatever the producers intended for an audience to like about the romance, more than half of it is taken away by the sexual politics. And JUST BECAUSE YOU KNOW THIS… just because you’re willing to make several Emilys activist political guard dogs, doesn’t excuse the fact that it takes almost nothing to show Owen as stalker instead of waif.
There once was a co-ed named Em
On this night, she caught one of “them”
The guy couldn’t let go
Without letting her know
That he didn’t give easy *ahem*
Rated PG-13, 111 Minutes
Director: Alicia McDonald
Writer: Rachel Hirons
Genre: Movies that are difficult to resolve post #MeToo
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Hopeless romantics
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: “This is problematic, right?”
