After We Collided

Roger Kumble’s 2020 film is the second of five made between 2019 and 2023; Jenny Gage directed the first, Castille Landon the last three. Anna Todd began the source on Wattpad in 2013 as One Direction fan fiction, posting as imaginator1d with Harry Styles as the model for the male lead, almost a chapter a day for over a year. Gallery Books took it in 2014 and the character became Hardin Scott. Todd co-wrote this screenplay with Mario Celaya and produced it; she had no writing credit on the first. The certificate moved too: PG-13 became R, so the same breakup and reunion loop plays in franker scenes. One continuity break is hard to miss: Hardin’s father Ken and Landon’s mother Karen were Peter Gallagher and Jennifer Beals in the first film, and are Rob Estes and Karimah Westbrook here. Shooting began in Atlanta in August 2019, and the pandemic put it into cinemas and video on demand on the same October 2020 day, taking 48 million dollars against a 14 million budget. A good fit if two different actors playing the same parents across films one and two will not break the spell. Not for anyone who wants the trust question settled here, since it runs through three more films to 2023.