The Vow film review

Here’s a question to mull over around the water cooler:  if the past five years of your memory were lost, would you try to re-live them the same way you did or would you wipe the slate clean by just picking up where your last memory ended?

Inspired by true events, The Vow tells the heartfelt story of a young newlywed couple who are involved in a serious car accident. While Leo (Channing Tatum) manages to escape the collision relatively unscathed, his wife Paige (Rachel McAdams) suffers massive head trauma, leaving her with no memory of the past half-decade – the timeframe in which the couple met, fell in love and got married. With no recollection of her life with Leo, Paige naturally gravitates back to the life she can recall: five years earlier when she was a young, privileged law student, not just in love but engaged to another man.

Leo desperately attempts to make Paige remember the life they happily led before the accident by throwing her headfirst back into the way things were, but his efforts are in vain and (unsurprisingly) this is where the story begins…

The Vow is an easy watch, built on a storyline that (despite the hefty use of clichés) isn’t as predictable as one might think. Aesthetically, McAdams and Tatum make a ‘so-good-looking-it-hurts’ type of couple (and yes girls, he does get his shirt off… in fact, he is actually naked at one stage – worth ticket price alone?!), although their onscreen chemistry is pretty lackluster. With most of the detail stacked towards the front end of the film, as soon as the storyline peaks, the end seems to roll around pretty quickly – sort of like a race to the finish.

There has been no shortage of top-notch box office flicks this year, but it’s been a while since an A-list romance has graced our screens. Although The Vow has a few pitfalls, it still manages to deliver a decent dose of emotion and it also gives you something to ponder over the water cooler the next day. And yes, I cried at the end!

The Vow is out in Hong Kong cinemas now!