Campus Rom-Com Finding Emily Nails the One Thing Most Others Get Wrong
Finding Emily is a delightfully modern rom-com that takes all the ingredients of your quintessential noughties love stories and updates them for a Gen Z audience.
Its UK-based setting also makes it stand out, with the movie essentially being a love letter to Manchester. However, what makes this movie really intriguing is its setting: the fictional Manchester City University. In turn, Manchester University was a primary filming location for the film, and one of Finding Emily’s underrated strengths is its realistic portrayal of UK student life.
While I finished university nearly six years ago, it’s hard not to feel nostalgic about my time as a student. Although I look back and cringe at a lot of it, I have (mostly) fond memories of my time involved with the students’ union and student media. And the thing about Finding Emily is that, when it comes to capturing the essence of student life, it is extremely relatable.
Student Politics In Finding Emily
Student media and campus politics are both essential to the plot of Finding Emily. In a bid to help Owen find the girl he met, who is a student at the university, Emily (a different one) gives him all the email addresses of all registered students under that name. I’m not saying that GDPR breaches make me nostalgic, but the most interesting part is what happens after.
Inadvertently, Owen starts an on-campus movement of Emilys, with the students’ union president leading the protests against him. While it's intense, the protests are played up for comic effect in the movie, and honestly, it’s the accuracy of it that makes it all so funny.
These protests are impassioned, enraged, and arguably, all a little bit unnecessary. It really hits the nail on the head about how living in this campus bubble can lead to a kind of pressure cooker of relentless activism about pretty much anything or everything. It’s a type of intensity that is difficult to replicate because it’s so specific, and the way it all snowballs throughout the film just adds to the accuracy. That isn’t to say that all the issues raised by these protests are unimportant — but as the film demonstrates, the overall reaction does border on navel-gazing.
The Role Of Student Media In Finding Emily
Along with this general sense of performativity, student media also plays a huge role. Owen’s quest to find Emily leads him to the university’s own broadcasting channel, which is led by (presumably) a student who takes her job very seriously. She interviews Owen with the tenacity of Emily Maitlis, runs an extremely tight ship, and never misses the opportunity for a good story.
In my case, I was more involved with the student paper, but the way the movie captures these key qualities of a student journalist — especially with how seriously they take their job — is very accurate. I also appreciate that it serves as a vehicle to move the story forward, as it helps to demonstrate just how intertwined student journalism can become with what’s going on on campus.
This portrayal harkens back to an earlier point I made about how student life can feel like being in a bubble. As someone who has been there, I can confirm that student media is definitely part of that bubble, too.
The good thing about Finding Emily is that it doesn’t necessarily pop that bubble. Instead, it allows the viewer to enter it, and while the film isn’t afraid of making fun of these aspects of student life, the accuracy tells me that there’s a sense of affection towards it, too. This healthy mix ultimately allows the film to be in equal parts nostalgic and funny. It reminds ex-students that it’s good to laugh at yourself sometimes. In that sense, and in my case, Finding Emily is definitely a success.
