Regretting You: Middling Romantic Melodrama

When it comes to big time romantic dramas as of late, Colleen Hoover is the only name in town and that does not appear to be changing anytime soon. Studios, always looking to leverage popular IP, have taken notice, adapting the best-selling author’s works into feature films. The first of those, 2024’s It Ends With Us, backstage drama aside, proved a successful adaptation, grossing over $350 million at the worldwide box office. Hoover’s next work to get the big screen treatment is her 2019 book, ‘Regretting You,’ a film that hopes to repeat the haul from her previous adaptation. The aptly-titled Regretting You, if anything, knows its target audiences and makes little effort to appeal to anyone else, not that it has to. To the film’s credit, the right pieces are there, from is cast, to its themes. The problem with that, however, is it an overstuffed film that takes on far too much, resorting to melodrama in an attempt to distract from its lack of depth. That being said, the choice to market it as a teen romantic drama make sense, considering the casting of two of the biggest young stars working today in Mason Thames and Mckenna Grace. Ultimately, the film is about much more. Working better as a compelling tale about grief, trying to be both is where it fails, not doing either justice. Though when looking at it deeper, plenty more flaws arise.

As mentioned, Regretting You, based on the book of the same name by Colleen Hoover, takes place in a small North Carolina town and is centered around the relationship between Clara Grant (Grace), and her mother Morgan (Williams), as they are left reeling from a shocking accident took the lives of her father Chris (Scott Eastwood) and her aunt Jenny (Willa Fitzgerald). Leaving the mother and daughter, as well as Jenny’s husband and Chris’ best friend Jonah (Franco) behind, the three had to find a way to pick up the pieces and move forward. Knowing each other since childhood, Morgan, Jenny, Chris, and Jonah shared a long and complicated history that the film would dive into to establish that dynamic and how it evolved from the past to the present. As far as Clara, Morgan, and Jonah were concerned, the grieving process left them with a lot to unpack, especially the latter two who shouldered much of the emotional load in digging into their pasts and the circumstances the led to the accident. Within that exploration came some heartbreaking truths that threatened what the memory of their lost loved ones, while Jonah struggled to hide his feelings for Morgan.

Looking up to her father and aunt, Morgan’s primary concern was to protect Clara from the truth, which in turn added to the level of difficulty of navigating around one another. Processing their grief in their own ways, the threat of that truth drove a deeper wedge between Morgan and Clara. Meanwhile, Clara developed a relationship with Miller Adams (Thames), one of the most popular boys at their high school. Over time, that relationship grew into something more, as he became a refuge for her to escape to when the pressure got too much at home. Just like most teenage girls, Clara argued with her mother and regularly lashed out with her own usual acts of defiance, like sneaking out and hanging out with boys she did not approve of. In the end, though she may have had feelings for Miller, he and Clara’s relationship was just as much of a means to get back at her mother, subconsciously or not. Picking up on that tension, in spite of it, Miller still had feelings for Clara, but the latter still had her issues to work out first. As Morgan and Jonah were making sense of what had happened themselves, it was only a matter of time until the truth broke through and found a way to mend the gap between them.

On one side, there’s Clara and Miller’s romance and on the other, there’s the grief angle between Clara, Morgan, and Jonah, each connected by an excess of melodrama. In comparison, the latter was easily the better of the two, but in trying to force both subplots in, the film failed to do either justice. An ordinary romance with bouts of painful dialogue, charm can only get it so far. On the other hand, the grief subplot proved more successful, exploring the arc of the dynamic between Morgan, Jonah, Chris, and Jenny and following Morgan and Jonah as they tried to pick up the pieces and try to move forward. The main driving force is the great chemistry of Williams and Franco. They are easily the best part of the film, making the most out of meatier roles than Clara and Miller (though some audiences may gravitate more towards the younger pairing). However, to their credit, Grace and Thames do the best with what they’re given, which is not as much. In addition, their chemistry is not nearly as strong.

Regretting You will hit the right notes with fans, but its middle-of-the-road execution leaves much to be desired and little to latch on to.

still courtesy of Paramount Pictures

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.