One Night Only: A delightfully sexy romp

One Night Only (2026) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five); rated R, for frequent profanity, sexual candor and surprisingly little nudity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang

Although one first must accept this film’s ridiculously unlikely premise, what follows is an unexpectedly delightful romantic comedy, highlighted by Travis Braun’s continuously cheeky script and two stars who share a Periodic Table’s worth of chemistry.

 

Allie (Monica Barbaro) and Owen (Callum Turner) bump into each other — not for the
first time — when they independently find the only bodega in all of New York City
that still has one precious condom for sale.

Think of this as a gentler, (somewhat) kinder response to the one-night-of-legal-crime franchise that began with 2013’s The Purge.

The setting is New York City, the time some point is the very near future. Thanks to the efforts of an ultra-conservative D.C. faction, three years earlier the “Mandate” became law, which outlawed premarital sex. Enforcement was established via the mandatory placement of biometric tattoos on everybody’s wrist, which signal authorities when unsanctioned canoodling takes place.

 

The ban is lifted for just 12 hours, one night each year ... and these events begin shortly before the kick-off.

 

Braun and director Will Gluck employ this gimmick as an ingenious means of overcoming the most persistent challenge in romantic comedies: how to credibly keep separating two people obviously destined for each others, without relying on clichés such as miscommunication or missed connections.

 

It’s a cheeky step up from the suspenseful “ball drop” on New Year’s Eve: Who will you kiss?

 

Throw in The Big Apple as a bustling, effervescent backdrop, and the result —unexpectedly — is delightful.

 

Owen (Callum Turner) is a hardworking pizza shop owner and hopeless, old-school romantic who has planned — down to the tiniest detail — how to spend this night with longtime fiancée Malika (Maya Hawke). Alas, their “favorite restaurant” preamble self-destructs when she abruptly confesses that she wants to take advantage of the moment ... by sleeping with somebody else.

 

Allie (Monica Barbaro), a talented singer whose stage fright has relegated her to the anonymity of studio work, has made a career of turning familiar pop songs into jingles for glossy pharmaceutical medications with impossible-to-pronounce names (a very funny touch). She’s a hopeless romantic with a vivid fantasy life, ready to Embrace The Moment with encouragement from best friend Arya (Quintessa Swindell) and “wing woman” Jacinta (King Princess).

 

Their goal: a genuine connection with a “quality” guy, and true love.

The Imaginary: Sweet, but slightly flawed

The Imaginary (2023) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated PG, for scary images and dramatic intensity

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang

Despite its often melancholy tone, director Yoshiyuki Momose’s wildly colorful film is a heartfelt valentine to children and their imaginary friends.

 

Amanda and her "imaginary friend," Rudger, enjoy wonderfully colorful adventures
limited solely by what she dreams up.

This is the third film from Tokyo’s Studio Ponoc, founded in 2015 by Yoshiaki Nishimura, former lead producer of Hayao Miyazaki’s Studio Ghibli. The Imaginary follows 2017’s Mary and the Witch’s Flower and 2018’s Modest Heroes, all three boasting the colorfully lush, hand-drawn animation that has long been a hallmark of Studio Ghibli.

And, just as Studio Ghibli dipped into British children’s literature with 2010’s The Secret World of Arrietty — based on Mary Norton’s beloved 1952 novel, The Borrowers — Momose and screenwriter Yoshiaki Nishimura have adapted A.F. Harrold’s popular 2014 British children’s novel, with illustrations by Emily Gravett.

 

That said, Momose does his film no favors with a chaotic prologue likely to overwhelm viewers ... and perhaps even put them off. (Grit your teeth and hang on for five minutes, at which point things will make sense.)

 

Young Amanda (voiced in the American edition by Evie Kiszel) and her mother, Lizzie (Hayley Atwell) live above the Shuffleup Book Shop, a charming little store her parents established in an unspecified English country village. But Lizzie hasn’t been able to make ends meet since her husband’s recent death; job interviews haven’t been promising, and the shop is days from closing.

 

Her father’s absence explains Amanda’s creation of Rudger (Louie Rudge-Buchanan) — please, never “Roger” — an imaginary friend who proudly boasts that he was born “three months, three weeks and three days ago.”  Thanks to an active imagination fueled by the contents of her marvelous attic bedroom — a retreat most of us would have hungered for, at a similar age — Amanda and Rudger share all manner of exciting, colorful and just-dangerous-enough-to-be-thrilling adventures.

 

Rudger is completely real to her, which — and this is the story’s core point — makes him real, although he can be seen only by Amanda. During their flamboyant exploits, all of them opulently realized by Momose and his talented animators, the two frequently chant a mantra:

 

“Whatever happens, never disappear ... protect each other ... and never cry.”