Entertainment

Waiting for Forever

A drifter separated from the love of his life at age 10 returns home to give her another go in “Waiting for Forever,” a drippy romance that makes Nicholas Sparks look like Leo Tolstoy.

Everyone keeps telling the delicate dreamer Willie (a squinty Tom Sturridge, clad in the hobo-dork style of a lesser member of Culture Club) that he’s such a free spirit, rebel and nonconformist that he has no chance with dream girl Emma (Rachel Bilson). She was his childhood pal until he was forced to move away from his Pennsylvania hometown when his parents were killed in a rail accident.

Emma, an actress who is home comforting her dying dad (Richard Jenkins, whose gruff wit is the sole bright spot), has moved on and forgotten about Will. She’s got a snarly boyfriend, but nobody (including her) likes him, and he serves as no more than the semi-beef-like chemical filler in this insipid little taco of a movie.

Hugs and tears and a mewling soundtrack fill the time with congealed emotion. These extravagantly bungled hopes-and-dreams discussions mingle with an even more appalling set of flashbacks filmed in glowy overexposures indicative of lost heaven. Also, somebody should tell Sturridge that the manic-pixie-dreamgirl act really isn’t very attractive in a dude.