“Hello, my dears! It’s been a while since I posted something on my little blog and I’m ashamed of this. Truth be told, I’ve been trying to find motivation to open my laptop and start writing but, you know… I didn’t really have the mood.
Since a few weeks ago, I started to get bored by things I used to like and the same was for my guilty pleasure: watching tons of series. So I started watching movies instead.
And so I started searching for romantic movies and I found one that was clearly my cup of tea (you get it? my cup of tea… since this is “the daily tea”… no? ok.) And that movie is “Forever my girl”.
To be honest, I didn’t know what was the plot of the movie, the poster just caught my attention. Only after watching the first minutes I realized it has a country music theme (and I’m a huge country music lover). I was so happy that it felt like it was meant to be this way.
This movie was not what I was expecting it to be though. It wasn’t like any other romantic story that makes single people feel sad because they don’t have a relationship. This movie really hit me hard emotionally. And that’s when I thought that I should write a review of this movie because I really found myself in the main character. If you haven’t watch the movie yet, you may not want to read this. It will have lots of SPOILERS. But as you wish.
The movie opens with a happy image: a wedding. Here we meet Josie, the female lead, who’s preparing to get married to her boyfriend, Liam, a fresh talent in the country music industry. The event gets a dark color when Josie’s best friend tells her that Liam is not coming to the wedding anymore, leaving his bride before going down the aisle.
The events continue 8 years later. Liam is a very successful singer, he’s traveling across the country, girls are crazy for him, but behind the scenes, his life isn’t as shiny as it looks. Vodka and one night stands seem to be his way of trying to fill an empty space. His manager is not helping him either, since he is putting pressure on Liam to write new songs.
Some sad news make the star go back to his origins. One morning, Liam finds out that one of his best friends from high school was killed in a car accident, so, without a second thought, the singer secretly goes back to his hometown, Saint Augustine, to participate at the funeral, missing a whole concert he had to do.
Even though he hasn’t been home for eight years, he doesn’t get a warm welcome from the people in town. Josie isn’t happy either when she sees him, literally giving Liam a punch in the stomach. (yikes)
The singer stays with his father, Pastor Brian, who is also bitter about his famous son that never kept in contact with his family. While roaming the streets, meeting with lots of people and old friends, he sees Josie entering a flower shop, later finding out that it was her shop.
A new face appears in the picture and that is Billy, Josie’s seven-year-old daughter. Liam realizes that he is a father and wants to get to know his daughter better.
Encouraged by Pastor Brian’s preach about forgiveness, and how forgiving people who hurt us makes your soul feel less heavy, the people from Saint Augustine welcome Liam with warmth like nothing happened.
With Josie’s consent, Liam spends time with his daughter and a strong bond is created between them. Also, Billy seems to have gotten the musical skills from her father.
When Billy stays the night at his father and grandpa’s house, the obvious question everyone expected came from Billy : “Why did you do that?” And this is the moment both Josie and Liam’s father realize that even though everyone forgave him, the actions and decisions he made were still making him feel guilty.
The parents’ relationship starts to bloom again after Liam invites Josie on an extravagant date, telling the media that “She’s the one”.
Everything goes well until one day, when all Liam’s friends decide to make a barbeque at Josie’s house. Billy and her father goof around and start a hot-dog eating contest which ends with Billy choking. The sudden crisis makes Liam freeze, his childhood trauma reminding him of the way he lost his mother. Actually, that trauma was also the reason he couldn’t get married to Josie eight years ago. He was so afraid that he will lose Josie too, that he thought that the best way is to run.
Josie’s brother makes the situation even worse for Liam when he’s telling him that his daughter wouldn’t be able to live a whole week with him around. Hearing those words, Liam runs again because of the guilt of almost making his daughter die, leaving Josie and Billy devastated.
Liam decides he has to go back to his family after his maanger gives him a motivational speech. Josie welcomes him back with open arms and Liam continues his tours around the country together with his family.
What hit me so hard that I had to write about this movie on my blog?
Well, I can say that I am 80% the same with Liam. I was so stressed and hurt while watching this because I could feel what Liam felt, I knew what he was thinking and I understood why he did what he did. Because I do the same thing all the time.
I know how it is to feel guilty for each and every wrong decision you make; to feel like everything that’s going on around you is your fault, even if, deep down inside, you know you can’t control some things that happen. And even if I wasn’t traumatized by some sad event in my life like Liam was I run away, being afraid not to hurt people again, even if they forgave me. And I’m not the only one doing this. Maybe you are doing this too. Maybe you’re too harsh on yourself.
This movie’s purpose wasn’t to emphasize the love story between the two lovers. This movie was made to show us that forgiveness makes us free, makes us see life with brighter colors. But it’s not enough to be forgiven by the people around us. WE HAVE TO LEARN TO FORGIVE OURSELVES. And this is the lesson this movie taught me. And I started to be less harsh with myself lately. It’s difficult… but I still try.
Even if you made big or small mistakes, don’t live in the past. It doesn’t define who you are or who you’re going to be. It’s normal to make mistakes, we’re humans after all. Don’t be harsh on yourself and don’t chase away the people that love you and care about you.
When you learn to forgive yourself, you already are a very strong person! Don’t lose hope, you’re not alone!”
That was all she wrote~
Thank you for reading this extreeeeemly long article.
Love you, guys!~ (ใฃโโกโ)ใฃ โฅ
๐ฏ๐ฝ๐ถ๐ ๐๐ถ๐ ๐ถ๐๐ ๐๐ฝ๐ ๐๐๐ผ๐๐ 