One of the things I like about films is when they pretend to be one story but are another. I think that's why I'm one of the minority of people that really liked Stakeland, a coming-of-age story pretending to be a zombie horror film. And so it is with that in mind that I say I liked this film because it was not about romance it was about healing.
The main character is an awful person. As he puts it himself at one point is he not a "fully fledged adult". He got caught up in a world which doesn't care much about individual people as long as they bring in the money. That doesn't make him bad at heart, but you are what you do. So when he comes back to his home town through an accident of circumstance he knows that he doesn't belong. He is completely lost.
Where this movie gets it right is by focusing on how others forgive him when really the main plot arc is in how he is trying to forgive himself. The movie pretends to be one about rebuilding relationships, his ex, his dad, his daughter - but really it is about him coming to terms with his own actions and taking responsibility. He grows as a person.
The actors in this film do a great job as well, remaining convincing in their roles the whole way through. They are all a little inconsistent, as people are, whilst remaining true to their characters. The show is stolen by the little girl - she delivers perfectly. Many children when they act seem to be taught to act like adults with childlike qualities, but her fidgety stumbling nature reminds me of my niece a lot.
There are two parts of this film that I think let it down. It is typical in these romantic films to have an act 3 breakup to then have the final resolution to close the film. This bit of the film felt forced, and I would have liked to have seen them take a different route here. It would also have helped it stand out by subverting people's expectations. But the main mistake I think they made was in giving the main character a get-out-of-jail clause in having him damaged by his mother's death. In particular the scene where he opens his heart to his dad only to have his dad apologise back ruined much of the plot of the film - it reduced the level of healing that he undertook by making it so that he wasn't such a bad person. This is too common a trope in films, that people are only bad because of a trauma in childhood that made them that way. We could have just skipped that part and focused on him just having made some crappy decisions that made him a bad guy and that would have made the healing all the more important.
That said the film is good throughout and not only worth watching, but probably worth a rewatch, if only to hear about the stats on convertibles.
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