“We Live in Time”, which belatedly arrived in South Korean theaters in last week, looks around the ups and downs in the relationship between its two main characters. While we get the overall picture of their relationship in advance via its nonlinear narrative, the movie gradually adds one moment after another to the story, and we come to have more understanding on how they try their best before the eventual end of their relationship.

At the beginning, we are introduced to Tobias (Andrew Garfield) and Almut (Florence Pugh). While the opening scene shows how they cheerfully begin another day of their life, the movie soon moves forward to when they receive a very bad news some time later. Her cancer is unfortunately back, and they are also told that she does not have much time to live even under the best condition.

Hopping from one point to another in Tobias and Almut’s relationship, the screenplay by Nick Payne builds up its two main characters and their relationship bit by bit. While Tobias is an employee of some prominent cereal company, Almut is a promising young chef working in a well-known restaurant, and they happened to come across each other via a rather morbid Meet Cute moment. Although the mood is quite awkward between them to say the least, it does not take much time for them to get closer to each other, and then they move onto the next logical step to our little amusement.

Because both of them had a previous romantic relationship and then failed, Tobias and Almut naturally hesitates as getting to know more about each other. For example, Tobias wants a kid if they become more serious about their relationship, but Almut is not so willing to do have a kid in contrast. Nevertheless, they still cannot help but become more attracted to each other, and then Almut comes to step back a bit when she is notified later that she has a serious case of ovarian cancer.

As already shown from an earlier scene, Almut eventually becomes pregnant not long after going through her first cancer treatment, and Tobias is certainly ready to support her from the beginning to the end. While there comes some conflict between them, they manage to overcome that via their growing affection toward each other, and there is a little humorous moment when it seems that Almut must be taken to a hospital as soon as possible.

Several years later, they continue to enjoy their life with their dear little daughter, and that is when that bad news comes. While she is concerned a lot about how her partner and daughter will be after her death, Almut also becomes quite conflicted about whether she should grab a big opportunity for her career. There soon comes a big international cuisine competition, and she really wants to participate in the competition despite her worsening health.

Needless to say, things get quite melodramatic as the movie shows more of the best and worst times of its two main characters. There is an expected dramatic scene where Almut must go through an emergency delivery with some help from Tobias and a few others who happen to be around them. There is a painful moment when Almut and Tobias conflict with each other over what should come first under their increasingly grim circumstance. And, of course, there eventually comes a tear-jerking moment when Almut tries really hard for giving something to remember for her daughter.

All these and many other moments in the story are pretty predictable to say the least, but the story is steadily driven by the good chemistry between Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh. While Garfield, who previously collaborated with director John Crowley in “Boy A” (2007), fills his part with his youthful charm, Pugh brings enough heart and pluck to her role, and they constantly click well with each other throughout the film. Besides some changes in their respective appearances, the interactions between them on the screen are also crucial in never getting us lost in the nonlinear narrative of the movie, and Pugh and Garfield ably convey to us the small and big changes in their characters’ relationship along the story.

The main weak aspect of the film is the under-development of several supporting characters around Almut and Tobias. While their little daughter simply remains as a cute little girl, we never get to know that much about Tobias and Almut outside their relationship. For instance, we come to learn that Almut was once a fairly good figure skater, but that is simply put aside before it eventually functions as a little crucial element for the aforementioned tear-jerking scene. While we never get to know more about Tobia’s job, the movie pays some attention to Almut’s cuisine career as required, but many of her colleagues are more or less than background figures except a young non-binary chef who comes to help and support Almut a lot more than expected.

Overall, “We Live in Time” does not exceed my expectation much, but it is mostly solid mainly thanks to the engaging efforts from Pugh and Garfield. Although it is one or two steps down from Crowley’s Oscar-nominated film “Brooklyn” (2015), its strong moments are good enough to compensate for its several flaws including the aforementioned one, so I recommend it despite some reservation.