For anyone who is even remotely into romance novels, Ali Hazelwood is a name you canât miss on all the listsâBookTok took her novels in as one of their own. And of Hazelwoodâs greatest hits, The Love Hypothesis (2021), her breakout debut, is arguably the most popular.
The book is about PhD candidate Olive Smith pretending to date Dr Adam Carlsen, all to convince her BFF Anh Pham to date the guy that Olive herself previously had a crush on. Carlsen is in the relationship for grant renewal purposesâStanford wants to see him set down roots before they give him millions of $$$.
The movie casts Lili Reinhart as Olive Smith and Tom Bateman as Dr Adam Carlsen (aka Dr Evil) and basically stays true to the book (readers are not going to have much to complain about). Thereâs the classic fake dating shtick, a little grumpy-meets-sunshine trope going (with great chemistry between the leads!), real rom-com energy, and plenty of cringe to go around. Read our thoughts on the movie below.Â
