While you’re 10, it appears like each line your favourite boy band sings is being aimed immediately at you. Someplace alongside the road, the phantasm shatters. Youngsters are smarter than we give them credit score for, and so they finally work out how parasocial relationships function: Principally, the followers do all of the work, saving up for live performance tickets and glitter-painting their idols’ names on their notebooks, whereas the lab-tested singers take in all of the love … and the allowance cash. However what if, as a substitute of the emotions flowing in a single route, a pop star fell arduous for one in every of his followers? Or her mother?

Bettering upon the favored seaside learn by Robinne Lee, instantaneous traditional “The Concept of You” stars a radiant-yet-relatable Anne Hathaway as a girl you possibly can think about a celeb swooning for. It looks like solely yesterday that the brown-eyed ingenue was placing on the tiara for “The Princess Diaries.” Now, in her most romantic function since that live-action fairy story, Hathaway performs Solène, a Silver Lake artwork gallery proprietor and 40-year-old divorcée who’s all the time made a degree of placing her daughter first. When her constantly disappointing ex-husband (Reid Scott) flakes on a visit to Coachella, Solène steps in and drives Izzy (Ella Rubin) and her mates out to the music pageant.

Dad purchased all of them VIP passes to a meet-and-greet with August Moon, the band Izzy was obsessive about in seventh grade (emphasis on: was). Now that she’s in highschool, the fivesome simply appears corny — which is similar opinion dad and mom had all alongside, however someway needed to put apart to be able to help their children. So think about Solène’s shock when she goes searching for the honey bucket and winds up face-to-face with Hayes Campbell (Nicholas Galitzine), “the British one.” Solène acknowledges him, however doesn’t get all starstruck, and one thing about that dynamic excites him. Right here’s a girl he may truly need to put some effort into attending to know.

It’s straightforward to see why Lee’s wildly profitable novel has been learn as Harry Types fan fiction, although there’s extra to it than celebrity-bagging want success. As tailored by director Michael Showalter (“The Massive Sick”) and co-writer Jennifer Westfeldt, “The Concept of You” appears much less involved with the princess-story facet of the ebook — the celebrity-endorsed, self-validating dimension the title refers to — and extra with the ramifications of such a relationship for a middle-aged lady. After dedicating a tune to her throughout his Coachella present, Hayes is extra discreet in his advances, permitting Solène to maintain it secret from her daughter. However what’s going to occur if Izzy finds out? What’s going to August Moon’s hundreds of thousands of followers make of him courting a cougar?

Miraculously sufficient, audiences don’t query it. The meet-cute appears slightly contrived, however the dynamic between Hathaway and Galitzine clicks immediately. She subtly conveys indicators that present she’s misplaced religion in romance, suggesting that as a result of Solène’s been burned by love earlier than, she will’t be bothered to flirt. For his half, Galitzine performs Hayes as immediately , however emotionally cautious as nicely. Watching these two heat as much as each other over the course of an art-shopping afternoon again in Los Angeles, proves much more romantic than the whirlwind tour of Europe that follows. Surprisingly, the sexiest scene in the entire movie doesn’t contain intercourse however a hungry first kiss — although there’s steam sufficient to return, as they ravage resort rooms in Barcelona, Rome and Paris.

In a way, the eponymous “concept of you” refers to a facet of the connection Solène naively thinks she will maintain to herself, regardless of the vulture-like means the paparazzi comply with them in all places. Showalter takes us right into a pop star’s inside circle, bringing the cameras backstage at concert events, aboard personal jets and alongside for a glitzy trip within the south of France. (Weirdly, reverse pictures of the arena-show crowds appear downright tame, nothing just like the delirious hysteria of “A Onerous Day’s Evening” or “TRL.”) Celebrities belong to the general public in a means civilian Solène has by no means skilled earlier than, and since she desires no a part of that spotlight, their love affair might as nicely haven’t any future.

That’s one side of the ebook that upset its readers, and which Showalter has fastidiously reengineered right here in order that audiences can have the ending they need. For all its fantastical qualities, the film is reasonable in the way in which it anticipates social media and actual media (the web tabloids, at the very least) reacting to the information of Solène and Hayes’ being collectively. It’s a tragic reality that, as Solène tells art-world bestie Tracy (Annie Mumolo), the world doesn’t need her to be glad. Technically, the followers don’t need Hayes to be glad both, preferring to consider him single and trying to find them to fill that vacant house in his coronary heart.

There are a thousand ways in which Showalter might have tilted the movie towards parody. As a substitute, he resists poking enjoyable on the complete pop-tart phenomenon, which meta-comedies like “Popstar: By no means Cease By no means Stopping” and “Josie and Pussycats” handled as self-aware satire. Right here, Hayes is petrified of being seen as a joke, and although Solène insists he’s not, she doesn’t take the connection severely sufficient to inform a soul. However Showalter does, tapping songwriter Savan Kotecha to provide you with a slew of believable hits, together with a monitor referred to as “Nearer” that turns the Might-December dynamic into catchy Prime 40 gold. For all of the challenges that adapting Lee’s ebook posed, getting the music proper needed to be the hardest — with fixing that ending being an in depth second.

The movie model finds an answer that honors Lee’s intentions — the way in which Hathaway’s character places any variety of priorities forward of her coronary heart — whereas offering a extra satisfying sense of closure for his or her on-and-off relationship. Galitzine, who performed it so correct in Amazon’s “Pink, White & Royal Blue,” turns up the emo charisma, whereas stress-free his physique language, letting the pet canine eyes and tattooed torso do the speaking (although the English accent doesn’t damage). Nonetheless, that is Hathaway’s film, and she or he owns it: unbiased, fascinating and by no means, ever determined. Solène’s a cool mother to Izzy, and in the case of Hayes… “I may very well be your mom,” she tells him. “However you’re not,” he fires again. Wouldn’t wish to get the unsuitable concept.