Synopsis
Some doors bring you to your past. Some doors lead you to your future. And some doors change everything. Sarah (Margot Robbie) and David (Colin Farrell) are single strangers who meet at a mutual friend’s wedding and soon, through a surprising twist of fate, find themselves on A Big Bold Beautiful Journey – a funny, fantastical, sweeping adventure together where they get to re-live important moments from their respective pasts, illuminating how they got to where they are in the present…and possibly getting a chance to alter their futures.
What We Thought:
I was one of the few people who said they enjoyed A Big Bold Beautiful Journey after the screening. At first I was a little surprised by that, but then I looked at who else was there and it started to make sense. Despite starring two fantastic actors (Colin Farrell and Margot Robbie) and being beautifully shot, it’s a different kind of movie. It’s something you’d expect from Michel Gondry or The Daniels and it’s also something you have to be able to relate to or you won’t like it. I’ll explain as I go along.
The gorgeous Robbie and great hair having Farrell play two strangers who meet at a wedding. Is it by chance or fate? That question is the key to the film. They both got rental cars from an odd rental car agency that asks bizarre questions and only have 1994 Saturns available. They force GPS on their renters and as the movie develops, it’s that GPS that will set this pair on their big, bold, beautiful journey (ha, that’s the name of the movie!). As the pair seemed locked together on this journey they go through doors of time that make them relive harsh moments in life or to see things from different perspectives than how they first saw them. I hate the term, but this journey is of discovery and figuring out why both attractive people are still single at their age. They relive who they hurt and what hurt themselves as they start getting closer together through shared experiences. The “will they/won’t they” journey is colorful, musical, comical, painful and everything you expect from looking back at your life.
And this is why the majority of my audience didn’t like it. There were two men under the age of 25 who shrugged it off because they don’t have the life experience to relate to late 30s/early 40sish characters looking back at life. Others who didn’t like it have been in marriages or relationships for well over a decade and forget what dating life is like or never experienced dating in today’s world. Those of us in the jaded cynicism realm of life can relate 100%. At one point I thought to myself “Did I write this movie?” because there are conversations in it that I’ve had in my own life. If you’ve never been asked “Why are you still single?” then this movie isn’t for you. If you’ve never suffered from life altering loss/trauma or questioned what you’re doing in life, then this movie isn’t for you. If you want to watch two characters having brutally honest conversations about their pasts, their relationships and why they are who they, then this movie is for you.
Mainstream audiences aren’t going to go for A Big Bold Beautiful Journey, they can watch Materialists instead (that’s not a knock on that movie because it’s one of my favorites of 2025 as well). Farrell and Robbie are two of the best going today and they are charming, easy to cheer for and will rip your heart out at the same time. If you liked Gondry’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, if you liked The Lobster or About Time then I think you’ll dig A Big Bold Beautiful Journey. I like all three of those movies and I enjoyed this one as well.
Directed by:
Kogonada
Written by:
Seth Reiss
Produced by:
Bradley Thomas
Ryan Friedkin
Youree Henley
Seth Reiss
Executive Producers:
Kogonada
Ilene Feldman
Micah Green
Daniel Steinman
John Atwood
Gino Falsetto
Ori Eisen
Paul Mezey
Cast:
Margot Robbie
Colin Farrell
with Kevin Kline
and Phoebe Waller-Bridge
The Nerds Templar 