Love, Rosie Review

Fans of Cecilia Ahern’s books (PS I Love You, IF You Could See Me Now) will no doubt be familiar with her trademark style of whimsical love stories incorporating plenty of humour and generally a happy ending.

The latest film adaptation of her work is Love, Rosie from her book Where Rainbows End. It follows her tried and true style to a tee.

We meet childhood best friends Rosie (Lily Collins) and Alex (Sam Claflin) over the course of 12 years, starting as they finish high school and begin making their first forays into the real world. For Alex, the real world offers a medical school scholarship to the states, while for Rosie, her plans of following her best friend across the pond from home in Ireland is suddenly thwarted when she realises she is pregnant to her loser ex-boyfriend.

The story follows Rosie and Alex over the next decade or so as their friendship, and underlying chemistry, intertwine with terrible relationship choices, bad timing and family dramas. It’s the ultimate will-they-won’t-they plotline, and while perhaps twelve years is a tad long to stretch it out, there is certainly plenty of charm and warmth in our two main characters and their supporting cast (Rosie’s dad and best friend are especially delightful in this regard).

Claflin is wonderful as Alex, embodying a Hugh Grant-esque likeability that I haven’t seen for quite some time. Collins is also commendable as Rosie, my only qualm being that she is so young-looking to ultimately be playing a thirty-year old single mum – it’s just not quite believable.

For a light-hearted, quirky romantic comedy, Love Rosie ticks all the standard boxes, with some added charm and emotion that elevates it to the top end of the Chick Flick genre.

Reviewed by Natalie Ridler

Love, Rosie is out in NZ Cinemas 23 October.

3.5 stars small

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