Filmmakers always seem to be trying to find ways to add some pizzazz to the tried-and-true rom-com formula. Recently, we’ve seen One Night Only attempt this with a kind-of-creepy premise and Voicemails for Isabelle enlisting the help of Taylor Swift for possibly the best movie I’ve seen on Netflix this year. This weekend brings another new romantic comedy to the 2026 movie calendar in Finding Emily, and while it’s Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, I’m not sure I trust its high score.
Finding Emily has an interesting premise, as it sees Owen (Spike Fearn) searching for his dream girl, whose name is Emily, and he teams up with psychology student Emily Raine (Angourie Rice) to do so. Rotten Tomatoes has the rom-com premiering at 87%, but the reviews I’ve read don’t make it sound like such an open-and-shut case. Take The Wrap’s Amelia Emberwing, for example. This critic acknowledges that romantic comedies don’t need to be technically masterful to be good, but she says this one is so poorly written it’s not even empty-calorie fun:
