★★★★☆ (Four out of five stars—minus half a star for that letter subplot, plus half a star for Sam Claflin in wet hair.)
Directed by Christian Ditter and starring Lily Collins and Sam Claflin as the titular pair, Love, Rosie trades the slick, high-concept premises of Hollywood for the messy, rain-soaked reality of Dublin and Boston. It’s a film about missed connections, accidental pregnancies, disastrous weddings, and the stubborn, infuriating, beautiful friendship that refuses to die. We meet Rosie (Collins) and Alex (Claflin) as five-year-olds, already finishing each other’s sentences. Fast-forward to 18: they are best friends, inseparable, and on the cusp of a shared future. Alex is accepted to Harvard Medical School in Boston; Rosie plans to join him to study hotel management. It’s perfect. It’s planned. It’s a disaster waiting to happen. love rosie film
Sam Claflin, usually cast as the charming cad (think Me Before You ’s Will Traynor), softens into something more vulnerable here. Alex isn’t perfect—he’s passive, occasionally selfish, and frustratingly blind to the obvious. But Claflin imbues him with a boyish earnestness that makes you root for him anyway. When he finally says, “I’ve spent ten years watching you choose everyone but me,” you feel the weight of every lost year. Love, Rosie is often dismissed as a glossy, predictable rom-com. And yes, the soundtrack is aggressively indie-pop (think The 1975 and Gabrielle Aplin), and the lighting is perpetually golden-hour. But beneath the sheen is a surprisingly unsentimental look at adulthood. ★★★★☆ (Four out of five stars—minus half a
One drunken night at a house party—where they almost kiss—leads to a morning-after pregnancy for Rosie. Too ashamed to tell Alex, she lets him board the plane to America alone, armed with a lie. From that moment on, Love, Rosie becomes a masterclass in the comedy and tragedy of wrong place, wrong time. Fast-forward to 18: they are best friends, inseparable,
After two decades of near-misses, Rosie and Alex finally reunite at her 30th birthday party. Standing in the rain (because, of course), Alex confesses the truth that audiences have been screaming at the screen for 90 minutes. The final shot—the two of them kissing on a Dublin street as the camera pulls back—is pure, unapologetic catharsis.
For anyone who has ever watched a plane take off without them, typed a text and then deleted it, or wondered about the friend who got away, Love, Rosie is a warm, aching, deeply satisfying reminder that sometimes the right train is just late. And sometimes, late is exactly on time.
Rosie’s life doesn’t go according to plan. She becomes a teenage mother, works as a hotel housekeeper, and watches her dreams of studying abroad evaporate. The film doesn’t punish her; it just shows her adapting. Alex, meanwhile, becomes a successful doctor, but his personal life is a series of polite, hollow relationships. The film argues that success and happiness are not the same thing—and that the road not taken can haunt you even from a penthouse suite.