Netflix’s recent romantic drama series One Day, based on David Nicholls’ award-winning book of the identical name, was greeted with some skepticism after it was announced. After all, it hadn’t even been 15 years since one other well-known adaptation of the novel, a 2011 movie starring Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess, got here out. Not only that, however the film was poorly received amongst each critics and audience members (though, like all polarizing movies, it has its own base of defenders). But the show has, within the week since its release, turn into an unexpected hit, as evidenced by the scores of posts on social media from viewers who’ve been left bawling their eyes out after watching everything of the series.
If the 2011 film was hard to observe, then Netflix’s recent rendition is absolutely excruciating—but this time, it’s a compliment. One Day charts the will-they-won’t-they relationship between two friends, Dexter (Leo Woodall) and Emma (Ambika Mod) by checking in on the protagonists on someday—July 15, aka St. Swithin’s Day within the United Kingdom—yearly over the course of 20 years, starting in 1988. Dex and Emma’s relationship starts with a failed one-night stand on the night of their university graduation; after an uncomfortable start, the 2 find yourself making a meaningful connection through a conversation about their futures, fairly than sex. Over the many years, the facility dynamics and romantic interest between the pair seesaw: At the beginning, Emma, whose profession and sense of self-worth is nonexistent, pines after Dex, who is blossoming in the general public eye as a television host. The tables eventually turn when Emma makes the jump from aspiring author to published author, while Dex, whose personal tragedies and subsequent self-destructive habits cause him to backslide, finds himself left behind and stuffed with longing.
What makes One Day so charming is this back-and-forth between Dex and Emma, fueled by a frustrating lifetime of communication errors. The show oscillates between two tones: horrendously awkward, which is poison for watchers vulnerable to secondhand embarrassment, and tragically sad, which is agonizing for hopeless romantics. If you, like me, are each, it’s a rough 14-episode ride that could have you covering your eyes.
Most of the unlucky timing between the 2 is on account of their tendency to rarely ever be honest with one another about their feelings until it’s too late—which, after watching the 2 best friends dance around one another for years, could have you screaming “Just tell the TRUTH!” at your TV. (Sorry to my neighbors.) The effects of this are exacerbated by the incontrovertible fact that if the 2011 movie feels rushed and poorly acted, this version is anything but. We not only have to sit down through many episodes detailing inelegance or humiliation between them—like Emma admitting she had a crush on Dex as if it’s previously tense (and the jokes he makes about it, brushing off her very obviously current crush on him), or Dex ambushing Emma with a kiss before she sheepishly reveals she’s seeing someone—but we even have to sit down with the characters once they are caught with egg on their faces.
It stings in a very good way that Woodall and Mod are great actors who turn their characters’ hurt feelings right into a full-tilt emotional experience. It is legitimately difficult to observe Mod, as Emma, attempt to work her way through Dex’s response about her so-called former crush. But it’s even harder to observe the more heartbreaking moments, like Woodall’s portrayal of Dex as he succumbs to substance abuse and makes the unsuitable small decisions, all of which is able to eventually result in him embarrassing himself on live television and showing up lower than sober to his parents’ home. It looks like a punishment to observe Emma become involved in relationships with two-bit guys because she will’t be honest with herself about her feelings for Dex, and even worse to witness her confidence crack while she works a mortifying job at a hokey British Tex-Mex restaurant. However, nothing is more depressing than seeing these two repeatedly misinform one another about their long-harbored love as they take up other partners, all because they’ve finally worked up the courage to be honest, at essentially the most inopportune moment.
It’s not all pain and mortification, though. The show smartly keeps glimmers of hope alive with sweet, fleeting interactions between the pair—barely enough to maintain the viewer going. When Emma surprises Dex with a kiss on the cheek in a sentimental moment, when Dex drops his jokey manner to remind a struggling Emma that she is deserving of the world, the pair’s seeming lack of boundaries or personal space, at all times in a platonic cuddle—all of those moments are designed to make you melt, though none compare to the milliseconds of screen time in a later episode that show Dex’s face when Emma merely walks into the cafe he works in. Such moments, laden with tenderness and chemistry, make the heartache that much worse. Here is where the series’ real strength lies: With more time dedicated to the story, we are able to feel its loss that way more keenly. Whether out of self-preservation, a insecurity, faulty assumptions, and even the essential cruelties of life, at the top of the day, Dex and Emma lose a big period of time with one another. The pain of that loss, and the cringeworthy ways wherein they make the ill-advised decisions that result in this end result, makes the sucker punch of an ending a much-needed knockout. By this time, you’ll have been covering your eyes for therefore long that, when you possibly can finally look again, it’ll feel like an incredibly satisfying emotional release. The gravity of that emotional release makes all of the twists and turns of the story, and the long, crushing pain felt by the viewer, price it.
Credit : slate.com
