Heartfelt and utterly committed performances from Rafe Spall and Emilia Fox are the bedrock of this sweet and desperately sad British film, taken from the autobiographical first novel by Somerset paramedic St John Greene, about the loss of his wife, Kate, to breast cancer, right after their young son had himself recovered from a tumour. An unthinkably cruel blow. It is a movie with big scenes and it did get under my guard: the sheer emotional candour from Spall and Fox carries the drama, whose action turns on the fact that St John has created a list of the texts his wife sent him in her final days, each intended to remind him what he should do with their two sons after she was gone, how they should remember her and how he should find a new partner so that they have a strong female presence in their lives. And yes, that is a bit of a weepie staple. But it is managed with honesty, dignity and conviction, and there are very real moments of personal pain. Spall and Fox are excellent, and so are Ross McCormack and Sophie Simnett, playing their younger selves.
