I do not mind telling you that I am a sucker for emotional movies.  Many avoid them because they do not like to be sad.  Such a stance is understandable.  Matters of the heart are weighty, and the world is heavy enough these days.  What I would suggest to those who think this way is that God gave us the capacity to feel deeply so that we can learn.  I am not talking simply about knowledge.  There is such a thing as maturity, and it only comes by experiencing life and all its trials.  Of course, real life is a better teacher for these milestones than movies, and I would not recommend today’s film, Regretting You (2025), as any kind of replacement.  Still, it is kind of pretty, I guess.

Actually, I had to guess as to what is going on at the beginning of Regretting You.  This pertains to being familiar with its trailers, so when it starts with Morgan Davidson (Allison Williams) and Jonah Sullivan (Dave Franco) as teenagers, I had to adjust.  They are in high school on their way to a New Year’s party with their friends, Chris Grant (Scott Eastwood) and Jenny Davidson (Willa Fitzgerald).  These last two are who the first two are dating, and more specifically, Morgan has learned that she is pregnant by Chris.  At the celebration, Chris and Jenny go off with the other revelers while Morgan confides this development with Jonah.  The film then jumps ahead seventeen years and dialog catches us up on all the developments in the intervening years.  Chris marries Morgan and they have a daughter, Clara Grant (Mckenna Grace).  Everyone is gathering at the Grant household for Morgan’s birthday, including Jenny, Jonah, and their newborn child.  Jonah had spent some years away, but had recently come back and rekindled a romance with Morgan’s sister, Jenny, leading to the baby.  The person missing is Clara.  The high school drama student is on her way back from a rehearsal when she spots Miller Adams (Mason Thomas) on the side of the road moving the town’s city limit sign.  Despite telling herself she is not going to turn around, if nothing else she is intrigued by the vandalism.  His excuse for the petty crime is to get pizza delivered to his house, which is where she eventually takes him.  It is only her respect for his current relationship that keeps them from immediately being in one another’s arms.  Upon finally making it to the party, she is grilled about this new boy.  According to her parents, Miller’s family is full of questionable people and they are not keen on their daughter consorting with him.  The one who objects is Jonah, who has Miller as one of his students and vouches for the young man.  There are other developments.  Jenny has asked her sister if Morgan will watch the little one as she returns to work the following day.  Morgan agrees to the arrangement, but is not prepared when she gets a phone call saying that Chris and Jenny have been killed in a car accident.  Naturally, the news is shocking for Clara and Jonah as well, but Clara has extra guilt.  She had been texting with her aunt at the time of the incident about the situation with Miller.  Jenny’s advice had been that her niece does not want to be the other woman.  The irony here is that, as Jonah and Morgan eventually learn, Chris and Jenny had been having an affair.  Morgan wants to deal with the reality less, and she also decides to keep the tryst secret from Clara.  This Catholic has to always shake his head at these actions because dishonesty is not helping anyone, as we shall see.  For now, Clara is confused by her mother’s behavior, especially when Jonah tries to dump his child on Morgan with the suspicion that the baby is not his.  It takes Clara going to Jonah’s home and reminding him of his duties for him to come to his senses.  Meanwhile, her relationship with her mother continues to deteriorate, exacerbated when she leaves Chris’ funeral early.  Morgan eventually finds her with Miller, and the fact that Clara had been smoking marijuana does not improve mom’s opinion.  It is at this point that things between Clara and Miller get serious, with the latter finally breaking up with his girlfriend.  Roughly the same can be said for Jonah and Morgan, the former coming over frequently and admitting that he has always loved her.  Indeed, Clara comes home one night to find her mom and former uncle kissing.  Clara is disturbed by the development, and she lashes out by inviting Miller over to have sex.  I guess this happens, but it is not without him pointing out that she is essentially using him to get back at her mother.  Clara apologizes and she and Miller end up falling asleep together, which is where Morgan finds them in the morning.  This day also happens to be her birthday, and despite the tense atmosphere in the house, Clara convinces Miller to come for her celebratory dinner.  The inevitable blow up happens, with Miller once again upset over being used, and Clara’s friend, Lexie (Sam Morelos), taking them out to share a bottle of wine.  The place they pick to drink is at the graves of Chris and Jenny.  It is there that Morgan locates them and manages to get them back to her house.  As mom is helping daughter with the concomitant puking, Clara admits to the guilt she feels over her aunt and dad’s deaths.  Before this can be clarified, she passes out, but Morgan brings the subject up in the morning.  Finally, the truth is revealed and mother and daughter are reconciled.  So, too, is the relationship with Miller mended, and a new but old one is allowed to blossom between Jonah and Morgan.  We close with Miller gathering everyone together to announce he has gotten into film school, and to ask Clara to prom.

The school announcement is meant to suggest that after the end credits in Regretting You, Clara and Miller will be going to college together.  It is a saccharin conclusion to a film that deserves to be sweet after all the pain in the middle.  Whether someone is deserving of happiness is a theme of the film.  Not to hit the topic too squarely on the nose, but literally one of the lines that comes during Clara and Morgan’s reconciliation is that they deserve to be happy.  This Catholic is here to say that there is some truth in that sentiment, but not in the way the movie undoubtedly intends it.  It is good that these two should build one another up after what they have endured, but it is not them who make this determination.  The only real happiness we can ever experience is through and with God, and it is only fleeting in this life.  If nothing else, this story is a reminder of this fact.  Granted, it is a bit soap operatic, though such events herein depicted are not out of the real of possibility.  If and when such things happen, they threaten that idea of happiness that Clara and Morgan seem to share with one another.  As such, it is little wonder that they lie and say hurtful things to one another.  We live in a fallen world where the people closest to us, no matter their closeness, can say and so the most terrible things.  There are no such exchanges with God.  The oft use Bible passage about God being love might seem cliché, but it is no less true.  The only real happiness we deserve is that which God gives us, and he does so abundantly and gratuitously.  At the same time, there is nothing we could do to deserve it, which makes it even more gratuitous.  Nonetheless, I do not wish to disparage the climactic moment.  Saying these words to one another is a good thing, and we should do this more often.  What is equally true is that it means more with God.

It is also true that Regretting You is a difficult movie to recommend.  It drags a bit in the middle, particularly as it susses out the dynamics between our two pairs of lovers.  It is predictable, too.  At the same time, I will take it over a great deal of other available movies.