Love at First Sight (2023 film)

20-year old American student Hadley Sullivan, who has a knack for tardiness and not always keeping a fully charged phone, misses her flight to London by four minutes but is able to get rebooked on the next one. Afterwards, at the mobile phone charging station, she goes to charge her phone and meets British 22-year old Yale statistics student Oliver Jones, who offers to lend her his phone charger. They get along well and eat dinner together. At the cafeteria, they learn more about each other. Oliver learns that Hadley is flying to London for her dad's wedding, having already divorced her mom, her three greatest fears (dentists, small spaces and mayonnaise), and that she is undecided on her studies. Hadley learns that Oliver is studying statistical inference and is conducting a research project, though he’s a bit shady on what it is, and that he also shares a mutual hatred for mayonnaise. Hadley admits she has misgivings about attending the wedding, but Oliver encourages her to forgive her father and reconcile with him.

Seeing Oliver is carrying a garment bag, Hadley assumes Oliver is also going to attend a wedding and he does not contest this. After boarding they part ways, but when Oliver takes his seat, his seat belt is broken and he is moved, funnily enough, in the seat right next to Hadley. They spend the flight falling in love. After landing, Oliver gives Hadley his phone number, telling her to text him, but her phone dies and she loses the number. With no way to find Oliver, Hadley goes to her dad Andrew and his fiancée Charlotte's wedding, arriving right before it's due to start. While still struggling with her father's decision to remarry, Hadley is struck by Charlotte's kindness and consideration of her and Andrew's happiness.

After the ceremony, Hadley overhears family friends telling Charlotte that they’ll be leaving early to attend a memorial service. After hearing some of the details about the woman who died, particularly the part about an older son travelling from America to attend the service, Hadley realizes that Oliver has actually come to London to attend his mother’s memorial, not a wedding. Hadley makes a split second decision to go to the memorial before the wedding reception starts in a few hours.

Meanwhile, after Oliver gets picked up at the airport by his brother Luther, they both head to the memorial which is Shakespeare-themed. While there, he goes to see his mother who is actually still alive, having decided to attend her own memorial before her death so she could experience it herself. Oliver's mother, Tess, had successfully treated lung cancer 14 years prior but her cancer relapsed and this time is diagnosed as a terminal illness. Oliver is unhappy with her decision to not undergo treatment and feels strongly that she should consider a treatment plan so she could get another potential eighteen months of life. But Tess tells him that regardless of whatever treatment she takes, she's still terminal and will ultimately die.

Hadley successfully finds the memorial service, where she meets Oliver’s younger brother Luther and his parents. After overcoming her initial confusion over Tess still being alive, she eventually finds Oliver. Oliver is happy to see Hadley, and after talking outside Oliver tries to downplay how he feels about his mother's death. Hadley presses him to be honest, observing that Oliver is using statistics to try and rationalize the situation rather than let himself feel what's happening. Hurt, Oliver lashes out and Hadley awkwardly leaves. While Oliver apologizes, they do not part on good terms. Oliver goes on to deliver Tessa's eulogy, in which he makes a heartfelt confession that he has attempted to measure his life in numbers to help make sense of his world, but that he cannot reduce his mother’s presence and meaning to simple statistics.

Hadley, meanwhile, realizes she forgot her backpack at the funeral and attempts to return to the wedding reception on foot, but gets lost. She borrows a phone and calls her dad, who comes to get her with Charlotte. Embarrassed about causing problems all day, Hadley confesses her feelings of foolishness about going to see Oliver. Andrew commends Hadley for taking a chance and doing something brave and provides her with closure over her feelings about his divorce from her mother. Andrew and Charlotte both apologize that their excitement to involve her in their plans unintentionally put pressure on Hadley. Hadley and Andrew reconcile and return to the reception with Charlotte, where they dance together.

Following the memorial, Oliver's family teases him about Hadley, but Oliver insists there is no point in pursuing her as the odds of their relationship working out are low. Having found Hadley's backpack, they find Andrew's wedding invitation inside and encourage Oliver to go see her, regardless of the odds. Oliver's father, Val, tells him that had he known that Tess would eventually die of cancer after having already fallen in love with her, he wouldn't have done a single thing differently. This prompts Oliver to take the risk to go and see Hadley. He finds her at the reception venue and finally admits his three greatest fears: germs, the dark, and surprises, due to his mother's cancer diagnosis. Hadley then gives him a happy surprise by kissing him. When she asks him what it is he's researching, he reveals it's the statistical probability of love at first sight. By the end of the film it's revealed that Hadley and Oliver will be married for 58 years and will one day have a daughter.

In November 2020, Haley Lu Richardson joined the cast of the film, with Vanessa Caswill directing from a screenplay by Katie Lovejoy, based upon the 2011 novel The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith, with Richardson also set to serve as an executive producer.[1] In January 2021, Ben Hardy, Dexter Fletcher, Rob Delaney, Sally Phillips and Jameela Jamil joined the cast of the film, with principal photography beginning that same month.[2]

In April 2022, Netflix bought worldwide rights to the film.[3] Love at First Sight premiered on Netflix on September 15, 2023.[4]

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 72% of 46 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.3/10. The website's consensus reads: "Love at First Sight gets a lot of mileage out of its quirky narrative gimmick and the chemistry of its appealing leads; although it's undermined somewhat by a lackluster script, this is still an above-average rom-com overall."[5] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 55 out of 100 based on reviews from 11 critics, indicating "mixed or average".[6]

• Love at first sight, the personal experience and literary trope

• Love at First Sight at IMDb 
• Love at First Sight on Netflix