Finding Emily (2026)

The secret experiment is the oldest rom-com engine there is, Finding Emily runs on it, and you can predict to the minute when the lie will blow up. A guy gets a girl’s number with one digit missing, and instead of shrugging like a normal person, he ends up emailing every Emily at the university and becoming a campus villain known as Email Guy. The woman steering him there is a different Emily, Angourie Rice’s American psychology student, who’s using him as the case study for a thesis arguing that love is a kind of madness. What saves it is the chemistry. Rice is sharp and a little sneaky, Spike Fearn plays Owen as a sweet, stubborn sound guy with no sense of self-preservation, and they’re lovely together. The jokes about campus outrage, podcasts and going viral land with a light touch. It holds a 90% on Rotten Tomatoes. A 6.6 because the cast makes a creaky formula feel fresh. $912 says you scroll your phone contacts tonight hunting for a number that’s one digit short.

What works: Angourie Rice and Spike Fearn have lovely chemistry, and the jokes about campus outrage and going viral are warm rather than mean.

What doesn’t: The secret-experiment plot is an old formula, and you can predict exactly when the lie will blow up and how it’ll be forgiven.

Who it’s for: Rom-com fans who like their meet-cutes British, nerdy and a little chaotic.