Starring: Emilia Clarke, Sam Claflin, Janet McTeer
Director: Thea Sharrock
Release Date: June 3, 2016
Rating: PG-13
Run Time: 110 minutes
Movie Type: Drama, Romance

Young and quirky Louisa “Lou” Clark (Emilia Clarke) moves from one job to the next to help her family make ends meet. Her cheerful attitude is put to the test when she becomes a caregiver for Will Traynor (Sam Claflin), a wealthy young banker left paralyzed from an accident two years earlier. Will’s cynical outlook starts to change when Louisa shows him that life is worth living. As their bond deepens, their lives and hearts change in ways neither one could have imagined.

Last year, my book club read this book for a discussion and I was not okay after finishing the book. I had so many things to gripe about when discussing the book. Mostly, this book made me sad and it depressed the hell out of me and I ugly cried through most of the story so when we heard that the book was being turned into a movie, we were all adamant about not wanting to watch it. We’re a bunch of romantics and we need that happily ever after and the ending for this book? I can’t even talk about it.

So weeks passed after our discussion and news about the movie starting pouring onto our FB feeds and on the blogs that I read every day. I heard that Khaleesi was cast as Lou Clark and Finnick from the Hunger Games was cast as Will freaking Traynor. Enough time had passed that I forgot about how depressing the book was that I messaged the movie trailer to my book club friends and asked, “Who’s in?”

Of course everyone was in because hello? Khaleesi and Finnick together on screen? We’re so there for that, only we couldn’t get our schedules to line up properly to go and see the movie together that I ended up seeing it for the first time with my daughter and all of her friends (my nieces and nephew). What’s funny is that we took my nephew along with us to see the movie because he wanted to spend some time with us before leaving to play football at Louisville and we took him to see this movie. Ha! He was the only guy with us and he’s this big hulking football player and he was sitting in the back of the theater with us while we ugly cried our way through this movie.

There was a lot of ugly crying going on too.

Enough time had passed that I didn’t remember all of the details from the book but the big things that I did remember made it onto the movie and I ate it all up.

So Louisa Clark is a quirky young woman who just lost her job at the town cafe when it closes down and she’s in the market for a new job. Her father just got laid off so she starts to feel a bit of pressure to find a new job to help her family stay afloat. She lands a job as a caretaker for a paralyzed banker named Will Traynor and her nerves and sparkling personality are sorely tested with each passing day of her new job. Will is a complete bore and she starts to dread going to work but eventually, things start to turn around for her when her and Will strike up an unexpected friendship. It’s not a perfect friendship but Will is completely different from anyone she’s ever met (not just because he’s rich) and she’s charmed with what she’s starting to learn about him.

Will has a big secret that he doesn’t talk about and when Lou finds out about it, she’s heartbroken. She doesn’t know how to help him or change his mind but that doesn’t stop her from trying.

I really enjoyed Emelia Clarke as Lou. She brought Lou’s sparkling personality and cheerful disposition to life so wonderfully that I was thoroughly charmed with Lou’s character all over again. I loved seeing the bumble be tights and the look of pure bliss on Lou’s face when she got them.

Sam Claflin as Will Traynor was another fantastic casting. I really liked his surly temperament and loved the way that his feelings for Lou changed and grew. I loved seeing his feelings for her grow. It was one thing to see the change come over him while reading the book but seeing it on the big screen was just great.

There wasn’t a thing that I didn’t like about this movie (hell, I was even okay in the end). The acting, the humor, the scenery, the music. It all completely worked for me that I went and saw it again two more times in the theater.

So while this movie had me looking like this throughout most of it:

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I ended up feeling like this afterward because that ending scene with Lou? I loved it:

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Grade: 5 out of 5