This character driven movie is beautiful. It is depicts a love story that started in an instant. I remember the moment that I met the guy I am in love with now just as vividly as he, Dell (Justin Long), remembers their conversations: first, a few in the middle and their last. Moments like that hit your soul and you rarely feel like you will recover if it ends or rather when something happens that brings a finality to your temporary separation. You labour on the choices you made and how things should have played out or what you should have done. You replay conversations and think about what you didn't get to say and what you needed to say. The movie is impactful because it shows a comprehension of that aspect of love and loosing it, and the hope for it's return when all seems lost. It's like being in love and you were tied to each other by a rubber band (love); you stay close, then drift apart and come closer and drift apart and then the "event" causes it to snap but you hold on the broken end in hope that they might too.

I love the dreamscape that the movie is perpetually in. It lends itself to the enigma that is love. Love can drive you crazy and set your mind aglow. The acting though simple is layered with many things happening below the surface. As the voyeur you are privy to things that the other character does not know and it adds to the suspense in the moments as they pass leaving each scene thick with competing emotions. I enjoyed the complexity of the characters. The truth of what happened, like in life, happens in the minds of the characters and even we the audience don't get know all that has happened.

I stumbled into this as a longtime fan of Justin Long who also thought it would be interesting to see the first major effort of Sam Esmail of _Mr. Robot_ and _Homecoming_ acclaim. I can definitely see some common threads between Esmail's work, as Long's character shares some DNA with Rami Malek's from _Mr. Robot_, being too smart for his own good and socially awkward in an aggressively abrasive way. I do think the writing leans a bit too much into these elements, as the pseudo intellectual musings sometimes feel so divorced from realistic dialogue that it breaks immersion. That said, the jumbled structure does a good job breaking things up, ensuring that none of the less convincing moments outstay their welcome. Ultimately, this checks a lot of classic boxes of a freshman film: a perhaps overly ambitious dialogue driven concept executed on low budget. And for the most part, I'd say it's a success. The non-chronological structure is just enough of a twist to keep the audience invested in a relationship story that might otherwise feel familiar. While I'd hardly call the film a comedy (though it appears to classify itself as such), there were some comedic moments/dialogue that landed well. And though none of the philosophical ideas explored were earth shattering, they were compelling enough to keep me watching. As far as criticism's go, I would say that Emmy Rossum's performance didn't feel quite as natural to me as Long's, but that might be partly a writing issue, as Long had more to work with.