The Idea of You, BBC iPlayer, Directed by Michael Showalter, Screenplay by Michael Showalter and Jennifer Westfeldt, Based on The Idea of You (novel) by Robinne Lee.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m002mrgq/the-idea-of-you

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Idea_of_You

Straightforward rom-com.

What’s the hook? Solène Marchand uses the wrong toilet.

I used to do it quite a lot. Pee up closes and against the side of the bus at football matches. But it has to be a lot classier. Cause Solene is really Anne Hathaway. It needs to be something better than that. You can’t just have Anne Hathaway peeing outside, or at all, if possible, because stars like that don’t usually pee.

Solene/Anne Hathaway has to have a trailer. You know, like on film sets. But this isn’t a film set. Although it is a film set, because it is an Amazon film. But a pretend of a pretend film set in which Solene needs to...you know, go—and she’s also escaping from the attention of an elderly woman fan of August Moon. It’s a bit embarrassing, because that’s the band Solene’s sixteen-year-old daughter liked when she was a wee girl. A bit like Take That or One Direction. Cheesy.

Solene gets to use the VIP toilets because her ex-husband is the kind of douche-bag that’s always letting their daughter down and blaming someone else. He seems pretty wealthy. As do everyone in the film. Solene works in an art gallery. They live in a lovely but modest five-bedroom house and the only thing missing is a dog and a husband that really appreciated her. But she’s got lots of supportive friends and Solene is still Anne Hathaway. That’s got to be good. Right?

Meet-cute.

The VIP toilet is full of VIPs. Or one VIPeeing. Hayes Campbell (Nicholas Galitzine) is one of the lead singers in the boy band. He’s the English one. The handsome one. Well, Solene certainly thinks so. He explains it’s not really a public toilet, but his personal trailer (we’ve already covered that aspect—we don’t need a trailer).

So they fall in love over a pee.

Plot. Boy meets girl. Boy loses girl. Boy meets girl again (and they live happily ever after).

Will he, will he, will he, won’t he? Oh no!

There are a couple of problems with Solene/Anne Hathaway being totally gorgeous and having sex without having sex. So we get the wave scenes and tumbling waters and lots of handholding and smouldering kisses.

But then she’s really old(er). So we’ve got to see her being the everyday type of girl that works in the library, but when she takes her specs off (or puts them on) becomes a sex goddess that doesn’t have sex. Think about that scene in A Wonderful Life, when after James Stewart has jumped from the bridge and Clarence the angel has given him his wish that he never be born. His wife is no longer his wife. You guessed it. She’s a librarian. You guessed it. Unmarried. Wears specs.

Solene doesn’t want to go to the pool. The other band members’ girlfriends are there. They’re so much younger. So she puts on a hat and wraps herself in a long gown. But she’s still Anne Hathaway, the prettiest girl poolside with the best body (we seen the waves moving).

Boy loses girl.

Girl loses boy.

Reconciliation. Romance.

It happens Rod Stewart and Britt Ekland. She’s the wow factor. And if Rod the Mod didn’t have a little nibble at Susan George and a jet plane of other younger girls, who knows what would have happened?

Ageing is like sex. You don’t want to show too much onscreen. Solene/ Anne Hathaway has to remain the same gorgeous person, but have to get used to having a different hair-do. So when her much younger love turns up on her doorstep with metaphorical roses, he recognises her.

Imagine what would have happened if she was a wee fatty? Or he was a wee baldy. Dream on. It’s Anne Hathaway. Different, but the same Solene. Maybe, put that thought on hold.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0CVBVVGD6