Content Warning: This article addresses themes and topics that some readers may find triggering, including physician-assisted suicide.
In the middle of her tenure as Daenerys Targaryen in “Game of Thrones”, Emilia Clarke found time to make a heartfelt, tearful romance film…and years later, it finds new life on Amazon Prime’s streaming service. So what is the film?
Released in 2016, “Me Before You” — based on the bestselling novel of the same name by Jojo Moyes, published four years previously — tells the story of Louisa “Lou” Clark (Clarke), a bubbly but unmotivated young person. woman who ends up working as a home health aide for Will Traynor (Sam Claflin), who led an extremely active life as a banker and athlete before getting into a motorcycle accident. Will struggles deeply with his new life as a quadriplegic (meaning he suffers from a devastating spinal cord injury that affects his ability to move his arms and legs) and, frankly, he has a very tough attitude about the way his whole world has changed, but Lou’s irrepressible spirit and daring nature charm him in unexpected ways, helping him live more fully.
Unfortunately, before Lou enters Will’s life, he makes the decision to end his life in a Swiss clinic that allows physician-assisted suicide. Even though Lou tries to convince Will not to pursue this path, he ends up doing so. Lou spends the last moments of Will’s life by his side, and after his death, it is revealed that he left him a large sum of money to encourage him to live. her living life fully – something she reads in a letter Will left with his last will and testament while she sits in her favorite cafe in Paris.
The film is certainly heartbreaking, but apparently Amazon Prime users are loving it. So what did critics say about “Me Before You” when it was first released?
Critics – and the disability community – actually didn’t think much of Me Before You.
Before addressing the critical response to “Me Before You”, it is very Importantly, the film made waves in the disability community – and not in a good way. Many disability advocates understandably felt like the film’s message was that life with a disability is no life at all, which is certainly this is not true, and the Critical Consensus on Rotten Tomatoes reflects this by reading: “‘Me Before You’ benefits from the seductive chemistry of Emilia Clarke and Sam Claflin, even if that’s not enough to make up for its awkward treatment of a sensitive subject.” With an average rating of 54%, which is officially “rotten”, what did individual reviewers say about it?
Roxana Hadidi, writing for Punch from drunken critics at the time, got to the heart of the matter: “Strong performances don’t make up for the problematic parts of ‘Me Before You,’ of which there are many.” In their review for VoiceAja Romano expressed a similar sentiment, writing, “In other words, if you’ve ever wanted your love story to have a disability and chronic pain side to it, ‘Me Before You’ is perfect for you — as long as you don’t actually do it I want a realistic representation of all these things” Meanwhile, in. New York ReviewDavid Edelstein was tough on both the book And the film, joking, “Fans of Jojo Moyes’ best-selling novel will be heartened to know that she also wrote the screenplay and kept all the lines which, when read aloud, will provide much mirth during of your next movie” However, just for a little balance, David Ehrlich of. IndieWire I liked it a lot, saying that “Me Before You” is “a film so wonderfully uncynical that it almost doesn’t matter that it’s not very good.”
What have Emilia Clarke and Sam Claflin been up to since Me Before You?
The bottom line is that, despite the fact that “Me Before You” was a major critical dud, Emilia Clarke and Sam Claflin have moved on to bigger and better projects. Obviously, Clarke continued to play Daenerys Targaryen in the HBO juggernaut “Game of Thrones” until the series ended in 2019, although that has also sparked much controversy (largely because the last episode was, uh, not very good). After her stint as Daenerys, Clarke embarked on another tearful love story – the 2019 film “Last Christmas” with Henry Golding and Emma Thompson – lent her voice to the 2022 film “The Amazing Maurice” and appeared in a romantic comedy with a sci-fi character. -fi twist called “The Pod Generation”, released in 2023. The same year, she officially joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe as G’iah in the Disney+ original series “Secret Invasion”.
As for Claflin, he rose to fame and acclaim for his role as Finnick Odair in the “Hunger Games” films before “Me Before You,” and after playing Will Traynor, he joined the cast of the Irish drama “Peaky Blinders.” You can also see Claflin in the 2020 Netflix original “Enola Holmes” – where he plays Mycroft Holmes alongside Millie Bobby Brown and Henry Cavill as Enola and Sherlock, respectively – and, more recently, Claflin received rave reviews for his lead role as a troubled character. (and fictional) rock star Billy Dunne in “Daisy Jones & the Six”. If you’re curious about “Me Before You,” it’s now available to stream on Amazon Prime.
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