Yes, this is another blog post about our planet’s best living actor, at least in the English language: Laura Dern. You’ll notice I’ll post about her a lot. It’s not a coincidence. In my opinion, she belongs on the UNESCO List of Intangible Cultural Heritage. Yes, that List really exists. So, there’s that.

I keep reading reviews of the film Lonely Planet (2024) claiming Laura Dern and Liam Hemsworth lack chemistry. Lots of those in IMDB. I’m genuinely confused. Did we watch the same movie?

Perhaps the problem is impatience. This isn’t a film of immediate sparks and obvious sexual tension. It’s a slow burn that builds organically through shared experiences in Morocco, through conversations that matter, through two people gradually revealing their vulnerabilities to each other. Katherine (Dern) is a solitary writer nursing wounds from being told by a long-term romantic partner that she’s unlovable or incapable of feeling love, one or the other, I can’t remember which. Owen (Hemsworth) is a successful young businessman constantly publicly insulted by his waifish author girlfriend for not being literary enough, living in her shadow after she suddenly hits it big. When Katherine and Owen finally recognize each other’s worth, the connection is genuine and earned.

The chemistry critics claim to miss is everywhere if you’re willing to look beyond surface-level attraction. It’s in how they listen to each other. It’s in the windows they open into their pain. It’s in Owen showing Katherine she’s lovable just as she is, and Katherine giving Owen the intellectual respect he’s been denied. This is adult romance – not teenagers falling into instant passion, but two thoughtful people building something real.

And then there’s that scene. When their physical connection finally arrives, it’s urgent and overwhelming precisely because of everything that came before. He takes her against a wall (or on a credenza – hard to gauge), barely able to remove her clothes in their haste to make love. Only afterward do they laugh about forgetting there’s a bed in the room. This isn’t gratuitous – it’s the physical expression of desire that can no longer be contained. The urgency communicates what a thousand words couldn’t: these two people are completely swept away by what they’ve found in each other.

The film’s ending demonstrates sophisticated storytelling. Katherine doesn’t deliver a melodramatic “I love you” declaration. Instead, her voice cracks as she tells Owen he wasn’t a distraction – he was “the whole point.” Owen responds with a convincing kiss and by gently touching her face. Her expression – surprised joy mixed with warmth – tells us everything. These small gestures communicate love more powerfully than any explicit confession could. I’m glad the writer and director trusted us to do without grand gestures, which must have been tempting when one of the characters is from the literary world.

Some critics seem bothered by the age difference, as if a 57-year-old woman couldn’t plausibly be the object of a younger man’s genuine desire. This reveals more about ageist assumptions than about the film itself. Laura Dern is luminous, compelling, and entirely believable as someone Owen would be drawn to. And she’s gorgeous, folks, no matter what year is on the calendar now. Owen’s nearer-age girlfriend doesn’t stand a chance. I felt bad for her… til she cheated. The film doesn’t ignore the age gap – Katherine herself nearly ruins things by insensitively calling Owen a “kid” – but it doesn’t make it the central problem either. What matters is that two people recognize each other as complete human beings worthy of love.

Perhaps what some viewers mistake for lack of chemistry is actually maturity. This is love that operates on multiple registers – intellectual, emotional, physical – all woven together. The passion flows from genuine connection rather than existing separately from it. That’s more subtle than pure lust, but it’s also more profound.

Laura Dern, at 57, plays a romantic lead with full passion and vulnerability. She’s aged naturally onscreen, and her comfort in her own skin makes her far more magnetic, not less. (She says she won’t have plastic surgery. Telling Laura Dern she needs plastic surgery would be like proposing to re-chisel Praxiteles’ Aphrodite of Knidos. It’s like saying the Aurora Borealis needs more color. You do not mess with perfection.) When Katherine and Owen finally come together, we’re watching two equals who’ve chosen each other deliberately, who recognize the miracle of finding someone who truly sees them.

Liam Hemsworth does a great job here. It takes a lot of clever acting to make an Adonis like him look like vulnerable tag-along boyfriend, and the brother pulls it off.

So no, I didn’t see a lack of chemistry. I saw a beautiful romance between two unkindly-treated people who discover they’re everything to each other. If that’s not chemistry, I don’t know what is.