Movie Review : Now is Good

Now is Good (2012) by Ol Parker. With Dakota Fanning, Josef Altin, Jeremy Irvine, Kaya Scodelario and Paddy Considine.

It's becoming an habit me watching the movie and then read the book it's based on...It happened with "The Host" based on Stephenie Meyer's book, and thank God, I've seen it before the book...If I hadn't, I wouldn't understand anything of the book!

And it happened again with "Now is Good", based on Jenny Downham's novel "Before I Die".

Here's the story

(SPOILER ALLERT!!)

Tessa is a 16 year old English girl. She has leukemia and took the brave decision to stop her treatments, since the cancer is at an advanced stage and can't be cured. Her mum left years ago, so Tessa lives with her dad and little brother, who have hard times trying to understand Tessa's decision.

When the doctor suggest her to do "as much as you can, as fast as you can" Tessa comes up with a 'bucket list', a list of things to do before she dies.

Her best friend Zoey, on the other hand, is very supportive and excited about doing some things from the list together with her, such as doing drugs, stealing from a store and similar. While burning some clothes and photos of her life before cancer, Tessa meets her new neighbour: Adam. He moved in recently with his mom and he's taking care of her after his dad died.

They start getting to know each other and Tessa begins to think Adam could help her realize one of her wishes: to fall in love. In the meantime, her situation gets worse and spends one of her last strong days with Zoey, who found out she's pregnant.


Adam wants to stay and take care of Tessa, but at first he gets scared of this kind of sickness and Tessa's parents suggest him to leave, but he keeps to come back.

Unfortunately for endless optimistic people (like me), but luckly for Tessa, the movie ends with her dying...luckly in the meaning that she doesn't have to suffer anymore.

While I'm not particularly a fan of Dakota Fanning's acting skills, I appreciated a lot Paddy Considine's performances. This movie is a touching example of how strong kids are and what changes in a family when a child has cancer.

Ranking: 2½/5

Ph: impawards.com & BBC.co.uk