When First Love Released
Even with the barrage of superhero movies and adrenaline-fueled dramas, the First Love Movie came out in 2022 and felt like a soft tune slicing through the cacophony. Directed by A.J. Edwards, the film set intention on rekindling the simplistic notion of how breakable yet crucial young love can be. Even in the teaser, the soft colors and gentle quietude made audiences anticipate Edwards’ latest creation. Around the world, film junkies started to associate Edwards’ work to that of Terrence Malick, whose pupil Edwards used to be. This artistic disposition surrounding the film is what made Edwards’ work stand out, not in the light of a popcorn film, but in the realm of a production that required deliberation and deep thought.
Simultaneous and Individual Story
The film follows the two lead characters, Jim (Hero Fiennes Tiffin) and Ann (Sydney Park) who are both in their last years of high school and in love. As they try to nurture their romance, the world around them is changing. Even the most innocent love is paired with real world weight and the movie is set during the 2008 financial crisis.
The story holds significance for Indian audiences. Consider how many love stories in India during have been stunted during the pre-liberalized India period due to the lack of money, family issues, or an unclear future. Observing Jim and Ann’s attempts to strengthen their tenuous connection is … Jim and Ann’s attempts to strengthen their tenuous connection is the same as the stories that lie in small towns and college campuses in India, where love is soft yet heavy with the weight of reality.
Regarding the ‘First Love’ movie, Hero Fiennes Tiffin is one of the stars. Off the Back of the After series, Hero carried a certain expectation into ‘First Love and for a lot of people, he was still that young Tom Riddle in the movie ‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’ or that brooding Hardin Scott that had a massive online fandom. But here, he stripped away that intensity to play Jim, a boy learning how to grow up while clinging to love.
It is the reality of the Fiennes family of actors that makes Hero’s performance so funny, He has long spoken of the desire to ‘build’ a Tiffin ‘brand’ and bust the myth of the legacy. Jim’s attempt to find a unique persona in a world that is massive and alarming is the same struggle.
Sydney Park: Torn Between Tenderness and Toughness
As Ann, Sydney Park added layers to the character of a lovestruck girl who, also, is painfully aware of the cracks in the relationship. Having built a resume from shows like as ‘Pretty Little Liars: The Perfectionists’ and ‘The Walking Dead’ Park has had more than her fair share of intense roles. However, in First Love, there was a stillness, a calm, and a soft, quiet vulnerability as if a deep well of emotion had been experienced and drawn from her own life of growing up in the public light as a child actress.
In the same way, the character of Ann also had to balance around those highs and identity struggles and there was a sense of Park in the character. The way she bears the character’s heartbreak is profound and deeply felt and it is because Park has had to deal with the weight of expectations.
The World Built Around the Them
In the film, the 2008 financial crisis is not simply a setting, it is a character. Jobs disappearing and futures uncertain – these elements reminded the audience that love is not experienced in a vacuum. In India too, there love stories where there has been financial problems – the love was there, but the reality was an invisible villain. The cultural resonance of this theme added a gentle universality to the film.
Diane Kruger and Jeffrey Donovan, playing Jim’s parents and rather his secondary characters, added a great deal of weight to the role. Kruger cast herself as a mother in Hollywood struggling to hold her family together and added to the role a certain sadness born from desperation. Donovan, an accomplished actor, portrayed the monotonous, downtrodden, almost shoeless, husband and father figure we so often see in Indian society.
Buzz and the Divided Reactions
Like the responses to the film, people’s opinions about its premiere were mixed. While some were bewildered at the lack of movement in the plot, most agreed that the framing of First Love was poetic and admired it’s dreamy essence and slo pacing. Fans of the After series starring Hero Fiennes Tiffin, were in for a rude awakening as the film was centered around his ability to remain still rather than shoot fireworks.
Those who chose to follow the narrative were rewarded with the work’s emotional honesty. cinephile circles, particularly during discussions happening online, were fond of drawing parallels between the work and the indie film, Call Me By Your Name, for it’s distinct ability to hold a viewers attention with the subtle and understated rather than the overly dramatic. Many viewers, specifically Indian audiences catching it on streaming platforms, were particularly fond of writing about the ability of the film to translate to the words of their own first love. That touch of bittersweet innocence that still lingers in one’s heart never truly leaves.
Behind the Curtain: What Few Knew
Getting the cinematographic aspects for First Love right required a lot of effort and time. Edwards, an advocate for naturalism, wanted the lighting and the soundscape to be soft and natural. This resulted in the crew losing time to both the weather and the light, and hence working in highly stressful conditions.
During the onset of the projects, the producers had circulated the idea of a more commercially bankable actress, hence the rumors of a ‘cast change’. But Edwards stuck to her guns and believed Sydney Park had a good enough balance of strength and vulnerability for the role. This is how Hero Fiennes Tiffin justifies taking the part. ‘After’ was such a whirlwind and for the first time in a while, there was some peace. Insiders suggest that ‘After’ was the reason he chose to do ‘First Love’, as he wanted to slow down the pace of his career to appreciate the more artistic side of it, rather than focusing on the fame.Why It Still Lingers Like a Memory
First Love may not be a remarkable box office success, but it surely kept its emotional value. It became a personal diary for the younger audience with soft hearted romances. It asked audience to remember their first kisses, the heartbreaks that they have gone through, and the continued reminiscences that still hurt but feel sweet. For the cast, it was neither a simple work, nor was it something extraordinary. It was proved by Hero Fiennes Tiffin while he was trying to work beyond a franchise. Sydney Park finessed by searching gentle parts of her powerful personae and where for A.J. Edwards, it was yet another chalk line to an artist, with painting by silences. The film was therefore like all first loves, It arrived with ease, stayed in the heart and then disappeared to leave an ache. An ache that was a blend of gorgeousness and suffering.
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