what if "one night only" is callum turner's go girl give us nothing moment
some thoughts
Happy Sunday, folks. I’ve stayed inside all day to read my little books and to avoid heatstroke. August—what a concept!
Mainly, though, I’ve been thinking a lot about the film One Night Only (2026), which is another way of saying that I haven’t yet seen the film One Night Only and have, really, no serious intention of watching the film One Night Only.
This sounds harsh, I know. After all, surely the film One Night Only cannot be worse than Emilia Perez (2024), a 132-minute fever dream (derogatory) from which I’m still recovering—and I watched that one in theaters.1 So what makes this new alleged romcom different? I am not, as we know, opposed to a hate-watch. It’s part of the game. Not every movie can be good, and you gotta find pleasure in the bad ones, somehow. It’s in the contrast. But I can’t see myself enjoying a One Night Only hate-watch. Not now.
Just a few days ago I wrote:
Before you ask: no, I haven’t seen One Night Only (2026) yet. Normally I don’t mind a cheeky hate-watch, but knowing my vacation and literary role model Dua Lipa had to sit through her husband’s bad movie … it breaks my heart.
If you didn’t know, ONO stars Monica Barbaro, famously known as the best part of A Complete Unknown (2024)2, and Callum Turner, famously known as Dua Lipa’s husband (complimentary). The film’s premise is fascinating in its Colleen Hoover (derogatory) kind of simplicity: for one night (get it?) a year—and only once a year—unmarried people can have sex without legal repercussions. To call it a flawed premise would almost be to engage too generously with the material, so I’ll just go ahead and cut to the chase: this film is receiving some of the worst reviews I have seen since the aforementioned Emilia Perez.
One Night Only, which was scripted by Travis Braun (a staff writer on various animated kid shows) and directed by Will Gluck (who continues to exhaust the goodwill accrued by Easy A and Friends With Benefits), doesn’t want to say something about anything. (Vulture)
“One Night Only” doesn’t present us with fun escapism, but rather a misguided, underbaked and very straight-guy fantasy version of what something like this might look like, which is essentially … lots of people kissing in public? It’s so tame, yet also weirdly conservative. (Seattle Times)
[T]he film is more embarrassing than incendiary, and its unexamined message — that privileged, straight people can still fall in love under fascism — is, technically, true. But building an entire romance around that premise demands considerably more compassion and intellectual ambition than [director Will] Gluck offers [screenwriter Travis] Braun’s material. (IndieWire)
I could keep going, but I think we’ve seen enough.
For the best non-review, might I suggest nic’s, which made me giggle repeatedly?
Again, I don’t want to misrepresent my familiarity with this film, which I have yet to see and possibly never will. But many of the reviews, while acknowledging how easy on the eyes Turner is—and he is indeed the kind of hot for which my grandma would pause a film, turn to me, and declare “you see, now that is a handsome man,” like yes, grandma, Callum Turner is hot and the Pope is Catholic—note also that his performance is lackluster, that the film is largely carried (to the extent that it even can be carried, given the source material’s weakness) by Barbaro’s charisma.3
And I just feel like there’s a marked opportunity to take something away from this. For Callum Turner, I mean.
In fairness, it’s not like Turner is a particularly bad actor. He’s fine enough, he’s just never quite managed to deliver a tour de force performance.4 His best, and I’m sorry if you read the last newsletter and you’re tired of me mentioning this movie, was his turn as Frank Churchill in 2020’s Emma., in large part because I don’t think Autumn de Wilde was allowing a single member of that cast not to shine. A personal best for everyone involved.
But apparently man cannot live on Jane Austen adaptations alone.
So now I say this respectfully: it might be time for Callum Turner to begin taking his craft a little more seriously. If he lets it, this could be his go girl give us nothing moment. After all, if it doesn’t swallow you whole, shame can be a motivating and edifying sentiment. Like, I know he has to be embarrassed, sitting next to Dua Lipa as she plans their next vacation, records a new album, and prepares her next hard-hitting interview with a literary superstar, and meanwhile the reviews to his latest film keep coming, saying things like “[Turner] has the aura of a reformed bully” and calling his character “the human equivalent of pizza — primarily occupying the frame as proof that any option is a good option if it’s also your last resort.”5
Rough.
To be clear, nothing can save a good actor from being in a bad movie every once in a while. Lest we forget, Christopher Walken was in Gigli (2003). Amy Adams in Hillbilly Elegy (2020). Denzel Washington in Gladiator II (2024). It’s inevitable, and there’s no shame in it. But man, wouldn’t you rather be considered the silver lining in a bad film (see: Alison Oliver every time Emerald Fennell makes her allotted one (1) good casting choice) than one of the many reasons why it doesn’t work?
P.S. In unrelated news, on a friend’s recommendation I started watching Task, the HBO show where Mark Ruffalo plays Mare of Easttown Tom Brandis, a weary and worn father and FBI agent in the outskirts of Philadelphia. No one else I know has seen it, and while the show is making me yearn for long walks into the deep blue sea, it’s also very good and making me crave a Yuengling, my beer of choice when eye was living in the outskirts of Philadelphia.
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Those of you who’ve watched both movies, please do let me know if ONO might indeed be worse than EP, although the very possibility makes me shudder.
Kinda begs the question: why didn’t that film ditch Dylan and simply become a Joan Baez biopic as soon as they saw how dazzling Barbaro was as Baez? Not serious people.
Again, I am not surprised; again, see: her turn as Joan Baez.
In my view! If you’re a Callum Turner stan, I’d love to hear from you in the comments. Here at Hmm, we’re always listening and learning.
From the aforementioned and aforelinked Vulture and IndieWire reviews, respectively.