Film Review: One Day, a waste of a day!

Obviously the film was never going to be as good as the book, but that’s no excuse for the movie’s lack of detail, disjointedness and Anne Hathaway’s accent, which was more like a public schoolgirl’s, and when she remembered with a Northern twang. I think I even heard her American accent at the beginning, start as you mean to go on and all.

As a huge fan of the book, I was particularly disappointed that the film failed to capture the spirit and like-ability of the main characters-Emma and Dexter. Emma’s efforts in theatre before working as a waitress were completely glossed over, as was her affair with her headmaster, and Dexter’s heady days as a TV presenter off his face on drink and drugs were only touched on. Most importantly, the depth of the relationship between Em and Dex was missing.

This left little empathy for the characters, especially when Emma was killed, a scene which was unnecessarily gruesome and gory, and when Dex was left broken sitting with his father eating soup.

The best and most accurate performances, in my opinion, were from Rafe Spall, who played Ian, his looks and personality were spot on, and even Jim Sturgess did the best he could with the script to portray Dexter.

However, the rest of the cast didn’t look and act as I had imagined. Suki was too obviously annoying, Slyvie too cold hearted to begin with, and Dexter’s father too common.

Making One Day was always going to be risky, but the movie’s portrayal of the book was inaccurate and missing its charm.