The Vow (12A)

Starring: Rachel McAdams, Channing Tatum

Though it claims to be "inspired by true events", nothing much about this amnesiac romance is persuasive.

Channing Tatum and Rachel McAdams play a cute couple livin' the boho dream in downtown Chicago; she's a funky sculptor, he's a budding Phil Spector (no, not in that way). Even their marriage vows are à la mode: "I vow to fiercely love you in all your forms," he declares at the ceremony. What is she, a shape-shifter? Blindsided in a car accident, she emerges from a coma dramatically changed: she remembers nothing about him or their life together. Into this seeming void step her parents (Jessica Lange and Sam Neill) and the businessman fiancé (Scott Speedman) she doesn't remember jilting. Can Tatum save the day by making his wife fall in love with him again? It's a question that carries less urgency than the film-makers intend, principally because one didn't greatly care for the couple even in their pre-accident days: Tatum's a bit of a plank at the best of times, and McAdams's reversion from kooky artist to sorority square has no emotional clout. Best forgotten.