Last month we had the “gay cowboy film”. Now here’s what will likely be labelled the “lesbian rom-com”. Yet, like the superb Brokeback Mountain, Imagine Me & You is less about sexuality and more about love — specifically the heartbreak and frustration of ‘forbidden’ love. Still, such despair can prove a troublesome bedmate for comedy.
With shades of Four Weddings And A Funeral, writer-director Ol Parker’s dialogue is peppered with tart one-liners and wry observations that wouldn’t seem out of place in a Richard Curtis pic. This appeal is bolstered by a good supporting cast of British comedy stalwarts, from standouts Celia Imrie and Anthony Head to The Royle Family’s Sue Johnston.
Yet the central story arc — bride meets true love on her wedding day and it’s not the groom — is structurally the stuff of tragedy, not laughs (indeed, Four Weddings only just gets away with it), and the script’s empathy for said husband (Match Point’s Matthew Goode) further confuses the tone. Perhaps if leads Piper Perabo and Lena Headey had convincing chemistry this would matter less, but their connection is more fizzle than fireworks — suggestive more of a fling than romantic fate. As such, despite the laughs, it all adds up to a rather sad, sombre affair.