A Big Bold Beautiful Journey (2025) Movie Review: Kogonada’s Beautiful Visuals Can’t Save This Misguided Charlie Kaufman Pastiche

Romantic comedies are among the oldest genres in cinematic history, which makes it both surprising and frustrating that Hollywood has shown so much resistance to giving them respect. Although the last few years have seen some truly inventive new spins on the genre, such as “Hit Man” and “Palm Springs,” there seems to be pressure to give these films an overarching sense of importance. The issue with “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” isn’t sincerity, as the few instances in which the film allows its characters to speak from their hearts are completely enrapturing. Unfortunately, it’s the weak plotting and abrupt moment of stylization that rob “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” from having any sense of emotional legitimacy.

“A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” follows the strangers David (Colin Farrell) and Sarah (Margot Robbie), who meet at a mutual friend’s wedding. Although they initially resist the impulse to flirt with one another, David begins hearing instructions from his mysterious new rental car, which speaks to him through a cryptic voice not dissimilar from that of HAL in “2001: A Space Odyssey.” It’s after a coincidental meeting with Sarah at a Burger King (in a rather disappointing instance of product placement) that he discovers she has been receiving similar instructions. Despite any apprehension they may have had, David and Sarah share a ride as their mysterious vehicle brings them on a journey through their collective memories.

It doesn’t take long to recognize that “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” takes heavy inspiration from the works of Charlie Kaufman. If the notion of plopping into old memories wasn’t a direct ripoff of “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” then a scene in which David receives mysterious instructions from two car handlers (Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Kevin Kline, both underutilized) is still a near exact replication of a sequence from Kaufman’s animated masterpiece “Anomalisa.” With Kaufman’s films, the idiosyncrasies were used to peek within the minds of complex characters, and wrapped their internal struggles up in a puzzle of literary allusions, metaphors, and surrealist humor. With “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey,” these unusual components seem inserted purely for the sake of “quirkiness.”

“A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” was directed by Kogonada, the brilliant visual artist who directed the excellent independent films “Columbus” and “After Yang.” Even for those who hadn’t scanned the credits beforehand, it’s obvious that Kogoanda didn’t write the script for “a Big Bold Beautiful Journey,” as it lacks the sustained moments of casual interaction that had made his earlier works so strong. The beauty of Kogonada’s previous films was that they created grounded moments of insight and compassion out of everyday scenarios, in which characters found emotional truths based on coincidences that they experienced. “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” is nearly the exact opposite; David and Sarah are told from the beginning that they’re about to experience a life-changing event, leaving no suspense as to what they will end up uncovering.

A still from A Big Bold Beautiful Journey (2025). — A still from “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” (2025).

The decision to keep the specifics of their journey ambiguous may be a barrier to entry for some viewers, as the film coast on its sense of whimsy without any desire to explain itself. This may have been more forgivable had there been any specificity to why David and Sarah were chosen, why this was the only way they could connect, or how they would take this knowledge into the rest of the world. The haphazard nature of how they are inserted back in time and left to interact with past versions of themselves makes every individual sequence feel cheap. The scene in which David returns to his high school production of “How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying” seems to exist solely so that Farrell could show off his singing voice.

The pacing of “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” is an issue because the film rarely lingers in a moment long enough for its characters to exist in a casual environment. A film like “Columbus” worked so well because Kogoanda used extended, low-key scenes to build a rhythm between the characters, giving them time to slowly adjust to one another. In “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey,” David and Sarah are exposed to so much information about each other’s pasts that they aren’t given the opportunity to interpret their own memories. It doesn’t help that the specifics of their anecdotes are restricted only to key breakups, breakdowns, and family tragedies; it would be hard to recognize what either character does in their spare time, other than stew in their own loneliness.

“A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” is the second screenplay from Seth Reiss, who previously shared a co-writing credit with Will Tracy on the dark comedy “The Menu.” “The Menu” earned both criticism and praise for its direct condemnation of wealth and pretension, and used the obvious nature of its satire for both shock value and humorous purposes. This level of heightened awareness doesn’t work for “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” because the characters seem to acknowledge cliches before the film commits to them. There’s an awkwardness to the transition between scenes, as much of the film consists of its two stars guiding the viewer from one baffling flight of fantasy to another.

Both Farrell and Robbie are charming enough, even if Sarah is so underwritten that the emotional revelations about her family made towards the end feel incredibly jarring. While it would be hard to blame either actor for a film in which they are (presumably) reacting to green screens that will soon be decorated with computer-generated imagery, the chemistry is simply not there. There are individual moments of acting that are strong, as Farrell has a standout moment in which he speaks to a younger version of himself, which would have been genuinely moving if it wasn’t dampened by an unusual presentation voice.

It’s hard to get angry at a film that looks as good as “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey,” as the overreliance on digital backdrops doesn’t prevent Kogoanda’s visual artistry from being acute. However, the film’s attempts at wholesomeness feel calculated, and at times even cynical. By denying the opportunity for its characters to exist in any tangible reality, “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey” seems to demean both its protagonists and audience. It may be a “bold swing,” for whatever that is worth, but it is not a successful one.