A Big Bold Beautiful Journey
Director: Kogonada
Writer: Seth Reiss
Cast: Colin Farrell, Margot Robbie, Jennifer Grant, Hamish Linklater, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Kevin Kline, Jodie Turner-Smith, Billy Magnussen, Sarah Gadon, Lily Rabe
Seen on: 3.10.2025

Plot:
David (Colin Farrell) is on his way to a wedding when he runs into car trouble. Pressed for time, he turns towards an emergency car rental service whose employees (Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Kevin Kline) are just as strange as everything else is. But he gets a car and makes it on time to the wedding where he meets Sarah (Margot Robbie) who, unbeknownst to him, made use of the same rental service. They flirt, there is definitely a spark between them but neither of them is willing to act on it. But their car GPSs seem to have another plan for them, taking them on an adventure.

A Big Bold Beautiful Journey really is all of those things: it has a big cast, a bold idea and beautiful execution. I loved going on this journey (and now I’ll stop with the title puns).

I knew very little about the film, and I loved being surprised by it, though I can see that people could be taken aback when it turns out that the film definitely veers into the fantastic and into the very meta(phorical). But since that is absolutely up my alley, I am more than here for it.

It is a very adult love story – not in terms of sex, but in terms of having two grown people, both coming with their relationship baggage. We don’t see the first time either of them falls in love here. The have been in love and fallen out of it as well. Thus, the film revolves around the question whether it is worth it to jump into yet another relationship when you could get your heart broken yet again. And even more so, whether you can learn to do things differently when you’ve already established a pattern in love.

Fortunately, the film is nevery cynical about it, even if David and Sarah sometimes are. In a resounding yes for love, it also maintains that you have to be honest with yourself foremost, but also with your partner, about who you are. Then maybe, probably, you have a chance at a new attempt at love and to actually do things differently.

The film is often funny (though Waller-Bridge overdoes it with the accent if you ask me), but it is more interested in the romantic drama, in the back and forth between David and Sarah and how they find their way into intimacy. Farrell and Robbie are really fantastic (and goddammit, so pretty). They have excellent chemistry and bring everything to great life here. I adored watching them and this film.

Summarizing: wonderful romance.