As the romantic comedy continues to make a comeback, Wishful Thinking adds some magical chaos to the genre.
Marking writer/director Graham Parkes feature debut at SXSW, the film stars Lewis Pullman and Maya Hawke as Charlie and Julia, a Portland, Oregon couple whose relationship is riddled with emotional highs and lows as they struggle to make their way back to each other.
After attending a couples seminar led by twin healers, the Tillies (both played by Kate Berlant), they discover that their relationship has a supernatural ability to influence the world.
At the couple’s best, their plants are thriving, Julia gets a promotion at work, Charlie’s song charts on Spotify, and their crypto investment goes through the roof.
But at their worst, he’s getting canceled for allegedly being alt-right, her company is going under, his mom might have cancer, global sea levels are threatening entire populations… and Jon Hamm is on his death bed.
With this discovery, they test the true reach of their relationship. But the more they try to make harmony happen, the less things go their way.
Pullman and Hawke incite emotional whiplash with their unique onscreen chemistry that works just as well when they’re at each other throats as when they’re steaming up the camera with a sex scene that feels like the world is relying on them to reach mutual climax.
The film is also blessed with some entertaining supporting performances, including by Berlant, who is twice as hilarious in her twin roles. Jake Shane also brings the laughs with an understated performance as Julia’s coworker, who is also her biggest professional admirer, with very little chill.
While the movie is brimming with humorous levity to offset the emotional arc of this complex relationship, there are exchanges that hint at a violent dynamic, as they note weed makes Charlie “emotionally volatile.” That dynamic is quickly clarified when Julia urges him to slap her during their experiments, only to quip after that she couldn’t believe he would do that given the “history of violence against women in this country.” Granted, she kneed him in the crotch moments before, so who am I to judge their scientific process?
Beautifully illustrated with a split screen of two perspectives of the same sunset, Wishful Thinking is ultimately a dreamy romantic comedy about the lengths people will go for the ones they love, as well as the realization that they need inner harmony to foster a harmonious relationship with others. And if that’s the case, who knows how far that harmony can reach?
Title: Wishful Thinking
Festival: SXSW (Narrative Feature Competition)
Director-creenwriter: Graham Parkes
Cast: Lewis Pullman, Maya Hawke, Randall Park, Jake Shane, Kate Berlant, Amita Rao, Eric Rahill
Sales Agent: UTA
Running time: 1 hr 45 mins
