Saagar Kote
‘Regretting You,’ a romantic drama film directed by Josh Boone, centers on teenager Clara Grant, who has a complex relationship with her mother, Morgan Grant, and her father, Chris Grant. Tragedy strikes when Morgan’s sister, Jenny, dies, along with Chris. Their sudden deaths leave Morgan and Jenny’s husband, Jonah Sullivan, grieving the loss of their spouses. Amidst this emotionally tumultuous period, Clara develops feelings for her schoolmate, Miller Adams. Faced with tragedy and the subsequent crisis in their relationships, the mother and daughter reach a challenging crossroads. They must navigate the complexities of their bond while making a crucial choice between embracing love or succumbing to isolation.
As they try to mend their relationship, they face their own insecurities, trust issues, and regrets. The narrative offers an intricate examination of trauma, loss, and meaning in the modern world, especially through the familial angle, while also dealing with the inevitability of grief and the redemptive power of love. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Regretting You Reflects the Essence of Colleen Hoover’s Eponymous Novel
‘Regretting You’ explores sensitive themes related to teenage, family, and love. Written by Susan McMartin, it is adapted from the novel of the same name by Colleen Hoover. Although both the novel and the movie are fictional, they comment on sensitive issues of life. In the book, Colleen Hoover delves into the intrigues of familial bonds through Morgan Grant, a teenage mother who sacrificed her dreams to raise her daughter, Clara. The mother tries to protect her daughter from the troubles of the outside world, especially to prevent her from making the mistakes she made in her youth. But the death of Morgan’s husband, Chris, in a car crash leads the mother and daughter into tragedy. The film has an extremely similar plot, in which the characters retain the same names.
The car crash also involved the death of Morgan’s sister, Jenny, who had an affair with Chris. The deaths and the revelations of the affair come as a shock to Morgan. This incident also pushes Clara to a point of grief, straining her relationship with Morgan in both the film and the novel. The emotional distance between the mother and the child is the main theme of the film. Their misunderstandings, trust issues, and trauma complicate the relationship. These are fictional elements in the story that realistically portray the essence of tragedy in human life. The study of the mother and the daughter through the feminine lens also adds a layer of uniqueness to the book and the film.
The movie utilizes creative liberties and visual elements to interpret the novel in its own ways. Though the plots remain largely similar, the two works give the readers and viewers diverse perspectives on the same issues. All in all, despite being a fictional creation, the film reflects the realism of the novel, which explores important social themes surrounding teenage, redemption, trust, and liberation in love.
Regretting You is a Nuanced Take on Teenage Angst and Familial Bonds
At the heart of ‘Regretting You’ is a sensitive take on certain social realities, especially that of anxiety among teenagers. In the film, Clara, although an imaginary character, represents the effect that loss and guilt can have on young minds. She finds it difficult to cope with the death of her father, which ultimately strains her relationship with her mother and also affects her pursuit of a romantic relationship with Miller. Her insecurities and uncertainties make her pessimistic towards life, which connects to a socially relevant theme of teen isolation.
In an interview with ScreenRant, the director Josh Boone, while talking about the film’s plot, opined, “I think a lot about that moment when you’re a teenager, when you realize that your parents are real people and that they’re fallible. They’re human, they have an inner life you don’t know about, and they’ve made sacrifices for you that you don’t know about. I think that’s almost a seminal moment for teenagers to become adults. They almost have to go through that to come out on the other side.” The layers of the parent-child relationship are unraveled by the film, which makes no moral judgments and explores the themes neutrally.
Mckenna Grace, who plays Clara in the film, spoke in an interview roundtable about the need to tell more stories about family, love, and loss. She stated, “I hope to make people who can relate to Morgan or Clara in this film feel less alone, and I think that’s always my end goal when creating a film that deals with especially heavier topics, (such) as grief and mourning of lost ones.” It is a difficult process to talk about heavy themes in films, given the sensitivity of the subject and the impact that such themes have on viewers.
But ‘Regretting You’ manages to handle heavy topics like death with a degree of responsibility. It doesn’t attempt to utilize these themes for entertainment alone, but to add a sense of authenticity and depth to the characters. In conclusion, the fictional movie, through the character arcs and plot points, provides a meaningful exploration of relevant themes and ideas in the modern world, while also using dramatic elements to make the experience more cinematic.
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