Film Review: We Live in Time – Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield shine

Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield are deliriously charming as a couple falling in love and then dealing with enormous hardship in the non-linear romance movie 'We Live in Time'.

Film Review: We Live in Time – Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield shine

The idea of your life flashing before your eyes is a well-worn cliché and, in that context, we tend to think of it as a chronological journey through the events of your existence. But actually, it’s more likely that your life would unfurl back upon you as a half-remembered tangle of significant moments – less an ordered timeline and more of a messy collage held together with gluey bits of cognitive sticky tape. That’s the conceit at the heart of John Crowley’s exceptional romantic drama We Live in Time.

We meet high-class chef Almut (Florence Pugh) and Weetabix rep Tobias (Andrew Garfield) as an already established couple with a young daughter, Ella (Grace Delaney). It’s clear that something hangs over their relationship and, through screenwriter Nick Payne’s ingeniously tangled script, we learn that Almut was diagnosed with ovarian cancer prior to Ella’s birth and is now dealing with a recurrence of the illness. 

It’s the sort of narrative setup that could easily divulge into saccharine, generically weepy territory. But in the hands of Payne and Crowley – whose 2015 film Brooklyn was a devilishly simple tale of displacement that delivered the most subtle of emotional uppercuts – this material soars. This isn’t an exercise in trite Hollywood cliches or soapy overuse of tear sticks; it’s an unfailingly real depiction of a relationship built on love and threatened by tragedy.

The heart of this, naturally, emanates from the lead performances. Pugh and Garfield have the kind of organic chemistry that every casting director wishes they could bottle. There’s a crackle between them in the early meet-cute scenes – including surely the best gag about a Terry’s Chocolate Orange in movie history – and an easy familiarity later in their relationship, strained as it sometimes is by events. This is also true in a series of characterful sex scenes that are eloquent and emotional enough to put paid to the idea that sex on screen is unnecessary. These characters love each other, and their physicality conveys the nuances of that love.

Garfield and Pugh’s is the sort of chemistry that can’t help but put you on the side of their love. When they fight, it’s like watching your own parents tearing chunks out of each other. You just want to hide under the stairs with your fingers in your ears until they kiss and make up.

This intimacy continues to shine through in the writing, which radiates authenticity. Too often, this brand of romantic comedy deals in characters who speak in the loquacious witticisms of screenwriters. Payne’s script here, though, pulls off the magic trick of naturalism – these characters are incidentally funny in the way that your friends are, not via the acidic wit of a highly-paid gag writer. 

It’s all part of the film’s thrumming humanity and nimble emotional storytelling. When the characters receive devastating news, they don’t always descend into a 10-minute monologue about the meaning of life. Sometimes, somebody’s stomach rumbles and they have a tension-breaking chat about the best chocolate in a box of Celebrations.

In this sense, We Live in Time excels in the moments between the big ones, and that makes it the sort of low-key drama that is unlikely to be rewarded at the most glamorous awards shows. But in a just world, both Pugh and Garfield would receive every statuette they can carry for their warm, funny, nuanced turns. All of human life is here in this film and it’s a joy to watch it flash by your eyes. It might just make you value your own life even more.

We Live in Time arrives in UK cinemas on 1st January 2025.

Header Image Credit: StudioCanal

Author

Tom Beasley

Tom Beasley Editor

Tom is the editor of Voice and a freelance entertainment journalist. He has been a film critic and showbiz reporter for more than seven years and is dedicated to helping young people enter the world of entertainment journalism. He loves horror movies, musicals, and pro wrestling — but not normally at the same time.

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