‘We Live in Time’: Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh Love, Cry, and Fight Cancer
We Live in Time’s greatest accomplishment is jamming more sentimental and silly incidents into 107 minutes than any romantic drama in recent memory.
That any of it works is due to the charismatic performances of the charming Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh. Yet their genuine chemistry can’t outshine the raft of affectations jostling for attention in Brooklyn director John Crowley’s latest, which just premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. Pulling on the heartstrings with tug-of-war-grade might, it’s a carpe diem fable that elicits more exasperated eye rolls than tears or laughs.
Of We Live in Time’s many missteps, perhaps none is as glaring as its decision to chronologically fragment its tale, which hopscotches between the past and present without much care for thematic or narrative logic.