The Drama

What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done? In The Drama, the answer to that question sends a couple into a tailspin days before their wedding. 

The characters raise several interesting questions: Is almost doing something terrible in the same league as actually doing it? Do people change over time or are we just better at managing, controlling and hiding the feelings and impulses that drove past behaviors? Do we really know the people we love? And where does love draw its boundaries?

Zendaya and Robert Pattinson proved phenomenal actors in The Drama. Pattison’s ability to express and hide his character’s feelings through his facial expressions stood out. The chemistry between the characters feels real as does the way they handle their crisis.

Now for the spoiler: The worst thing Zendaya's character, Emma, has ever done is plan a school shooting that she didn't follow through with. Pattison’s character, Charlie, struggles to process this. At one point, he tries to justify it by suggesting that many other people must have had similar thoughts and didn't follow through. Interestingly, survey results published in March show that 7.3% of Americans surveyed had considered shooting another person in their lifetime, and 3.3% had considered shooting someone within the previous year. Yikes!

I love the editing across the film’s opening. We start with Pattison’s character workshopping his wedding speech with his best man. In this way, we jump through different parts of the relationship, getting a sense for how Charlie and Emma met and how their relationship developed while projecting forward to their wedding. Simple but clever. 

The movie posters make this look like a cheap Netflix romcom. In fact, it’s a well-acted, thought-provoking film about the limits of love and understanding.