Liam Page catapults to stardom and leaves behind his hometown and everyone in it, including his fiancé. Will he be able to put his life back together? Here’s our review of Forever My Girl!
Forever My Girl
RATING: 3 out of 5 STARS
{Spoilers}
I had put off watching Forever My Girl for a little while, mostly because I was hoping it would live up to my expectations. I knew it was based on the novel, Forever My Girl by Heidi McLaughlin, and some of the reviews said it was different from the novel (less angst, more streamlined). That suits me just fine. I was in the mood for something fluffy with a smidge of drama.
This movie is just that.
Liam skyrockets to superstardom right before his wedding to his highschool sweetheart, Josie. The film opens with Josie getting ready the church for her wedding with her two bridesmaids, but it becomes clear very quickly that Liam won’t be coming to the ceremony and he has left her.
Fast forward eight years, and Liam is living a very hard life on the road. Sure, he’s super famous and has his pick of the girls who come to his concerts, but he’s looking rundown as hell. After a show in New Orleans, near his hometown of St. Augustine, the groupie he picked up for the night accidently breaks his old flip phone.
He runs to the nearest cell phone store where they fix it for him and he explains there’s only one message on it that he cares about. It’s from Josie and from right after he left. We don’t hear the whole thing, but that happens eventually at the end of the film.
During all this, Liam sees on the news that his friend from St. Augustine was killed in a car accident earlier that morning. Instead of moving on to his next concert, Liam goes home for the service.
That’s when he runs into (literally) Josie, the girl he left behind and her adorable daughter. It doesn’t take long for Liam to put it all together and realize that little girl is his. She’s named Billy, after his mother who passed away when he was little, and it turns out basically everyone knew about his daughter.
No matter how much Josie explains that this town is a family and no one sold this story to protect them. It’s also because they all feel betrayed by Liam because “he left everyone” when he walked out on Josie.
This is one part of the story that I call BS on because I know southern small towns and let me tell you, this right here would have been sold a long time ago by someone. Y’all aren’t that great of a family. But, I understand that for the plot, it needed to be this way.
Over the course of the film, Josie and Liam get closer again as they bond over their daughter. She’s a very precocious child that can play guitar just by watching her dad play one time. It’s sweet watching Liam with Billy, but it also feels like he gets away with the things he did too easily.
Liam’s dad admits that he sought him out to tell him about Billy when he first left, but after he saw the condition that Liam was in, he realized that Josie and Billy were better off without him in their lives.
Josie makes a life for herself and her daughter without Liam’s help at all, but when he comes back, it’s like he slips right back into the role he had without having to work too hard for it. I’m not saying that he shouldn’t be given a chance to know his daughter or even mend his relationship with Josie, but I feel like we let off our heroes too easy.
Yes, Liam listened to her voicemail every day for eight years, but did he ever call her back? No. It literally took him eight years to call her back and leave her a message once he felt badly for walking away from them again.
Granted, Liam does have a sad backstory, but it’s not like Josie isn’t aware of his family history and how his mother died when he was little. If anything, Josie could provide support to him since she’s been with him so long.
In the end, Liam and Josie reconcile, and go on tour with Liam as he completes the European leg of it. His daughter also sings a song with him on stage, too. Honestly, I didn’t care for that part either because it seems like Josie would be more protective of the child she’s raised than allow her to take center stage with her dad after just a couple of weeks.
Overall, the film had its issues, but it’s a good one to watch and turn your mind off for a little while. There are no sex scenes and the romance is very tame. Still, if you’re looking for a feel good movie that will take you to a happy place for a bit, this one is a great summer movie!
You can watch the trailer here!