B-

At a time when screen romance is debased more often than not, Lone Scherfig (“An Education”) shows there’s life in the conventions yet with this skillful comedy-drama, an adaptation of David Nicholls’ novel with a screenplay penned by the author himself. Apart from one miscalculation in casting—a major one, unfortunately—and a last act that plays on the heartstrings too insistently, “One Day” is a handsome mixture of laughter and tears, part rom-com and part schmaltz but overall reasonably winning.

Nicholls’ conceit is to choose a single day—July 15—when Dexter (Jim Sturgess) and Emma (Anne Hathaway) meet on their college graduation day in 1988 and then follow the development of their relationship by offering glimpses of that day (some very brief, others longer) each year down to the present. The characters mature and their circumstances change as time progresses: Dexter has great success as a smooth-tongued, if rather obnoxious television host before his career takes a nosedive. By contrast Emma endures years as a waitress before achieving renown as a writer. And though they’re obviously soulmates, they get involved with other people. Emma lives for years with Ian (Rafe Spall), a waiter who fancies himself a stand-up comic, while Dexter marries Sylvie (Romola Garai), with whom he has a daughter, though the marriage doesn’t last.

The structure is contrived, of course, and some viewers might find it off-putting: a similar sort of trickery, though on a more extensive chronological scale, certainly undermined Neil LaBute’s lovely adaptation of A.Y. Byatt’s “Possession.” But for the most part it works, even if in distinguishing the different timeframes production designer Mark Tidesley, art directors Denis Schnegg and Katrina Dunn, set decorator Dominic Capon and costume designer Odile Dicks-Mireaux occasionally seem to lay it on a mite thick.
And though the fact that the leads are fated to get together is never in doubt, Nicholls pulls a twist in the last reel that Scherfig handles intelligently, even if they both elect to use it to milk the audience’s tear ducts rather shamelessly.

Of the two leads, it’s Jim Sturgess who really anchors the film. Dexter has the greater emotional arc to travel, and the young actor traverses it adroitly. He also has the good fortune to play against Patricia Clarkson and Ken Stott as his parents. Clarkson once again proves herself one of the canniest supporting players around, getting in some humorous licks while also acing her character’s sadder scenes. And Stott does a masterful job as a fellow with a hard exterior but some real sensitivity.

As for Hathaway, one suspects that she was cast for marquee allure, especially in America, and though she’s certainly game, the actress seems miscast, especially in the earlier portion of the picture where she has to play Emma as gawky and insecure. The attempt to hide her beauty with a frumpy hairdo and some huge-rimmed glasses isn’t successful, and her performance overall comes across as mannered. Hathaway improves as Emma’s confidence rises, however, and she too is lucky to have somebody first-rate to play off (besides Sturgess, that is)—Spall, whose geeky charm is pretty much irresistible (and who shows he can go for the emotional jugular, too). By contrast Garai is pretty but vacuous as Dexter’s wife, but that’s really more the fault of the underwritten role than the actress.

“One Day” is a lovely picture to look at—the period detail is rich (sometimes too much so, in fact), the locations attractive and Benoit Delhomme’s widescreen cinematography lush. Even the aging makeup is well done. Rachel Portman’s score, however, does go for sentiment with a vengeance.

So “One Day” does sometimes stumble in bringing Nicholls’ novel to the screen, and Hathaway is at best a mixed blessing as Emma. But compared to the majority of today’s crass romantic comedies, which are crudely run off the Hollywood sausage factory, it deploys the tried-and-true formula with more elegance, cleverness and feeling than usual. Even guys shouldn’t feel insulted by watching it, though—like “An Education”—it really is a high-class chick flick.