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Me Before You (2016), PG-13, ★★1/2

Sam Claflin and Emilia Clarke.
Romantic dramas or Nicholas Sparks films or Nicholas Sparks rip-offs are my least favorite genres...ever. But, based on the trailer, it looked a little interesting based on the chemistry and the relationship between a disable character and a lovely woman. But, also, what is frustrating to me is the dialogue and the story in these movie when some random artificial or supernatural occurrence comes up and makes no lick of sense. The chemistry is there but there are some contradicting set-ups and scenes that do not make up their mind as to how each characters' fates are going to unfold and how they are going to feel and they try to cheer us up for a manipulative epilogue.

Louisa "Lou" Clark (Emilia Clarke) is a free spirit that has been recently laid off from a cafe and is trying to look for a job. Will Trainer (Sam Claflin) is an arrogant and sarcastic banker that cares for his wealth but he gets into a motorcycle accident. He is left paralyzed from the neck down. Lou is hired by Will's mom, to cheer him up and care for him but not care for him physically as an Australian doctor does the professional needs.

At first, Will reacts to Lou's spunkiness and peppiness in a cold manner. But, in a formulaic manner, they both mutually connect and fall in love with each other despite the fact that Lou has a marathon-obsessive boyfriend, Patrick (Matthew Lewis). Will wants to please her with a date regarding Mozart, he cooks for her and treat her with movies. However, Will cannot deal with the pain and suffering as Lou also tries to change her mind from doing what he has to do to save his life in an eternal way.

It's dinner time.
This British romance was actually better than most romantic dramas because of the chemistry and charismatic performances, however, the situation regarding a disabled person and some allusions regarding life-changing choices and suicide bothered me. There's some contradicting scenes as to Will bringing up suicide and deciding whether to be euthanized or not. I feel like they try to set the serious situation in a very murky and aloof way. If they want to deal with those subject, they had to go deeper with the material and allow us to feel a bit of sentiment towards the character. I did not feel much sympathy towards that character because he was an arrogant character that somehow, on a click of a button, his personality is turned around. It's not Claflin's fault but his character bothered me a bit.

Emilia Clarke was fine in this movie individually but I don't know if she can carry a movie yet for me. I feel like she'll be better as a strong female supporting character than a lead character because, there were, at times, her reaction shots got tiring. Sam Claflin is effortless when he has to give in some requests to treat Lou. Their chemistry was better than both of their individual performances. Matthew Lewis is in a throwaway role as the boyfriend but does not generate much charisma for me.

Director Thea Sharrock's movie is emotionally dishonest towards disabled people and towards disable people in a relationship. The emotional and dramatic conflict regarding death does not grasp much ability to entrance us to weep. Its dark themes and consequences does not give enough credibility to make us learn what he has been going through. We pay attention solely to the characters' romantic chemistry. In conclusion, it is filmed beautifully on an aesthetic level, but the corniness and dishonesty towards the dark material permits to me to walk away in disappointment. This movie does not do it for me. It is better than The Fault in Our Stars with all the murky and manipulative sentiment.

**1/2


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