Warning: This post contains spoilers for the book and movie versions of People We Meet on Vacation
Best-selling author Emily Henry didn’t set out to write an homage to When Harry Met Sally with her 2021 novel, People We Meet on Vacation. But, like Nora Ephron and director Rob Reiner, she wanted to explore the concept of whether men and women could really ever just be friends. Now, thanks to Netflix, Henry’s accidental tribute to her favorite rom-com is getting the movie treatment.
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Like the book, the adaptation of People We Meet on Vacation, streaming now, follows besties, free-spirited travel writer Poppy Wright (Emily Bader) and sweet, but high-strung teacher Alex Nilsen (The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes’ Tom Blyth), across 12 years of vacations.
After becoming unlikely friends in college, the two make a pact to spend one-week every summer trekking around the world together as totally platonic travel companions. The movie hops around in time, flashing back to Alex and Poppy’s past trips, but picks up in the present day. Alex and Poppy haven’t spoken in two years, after things got a little weird during their visit to Tuscany on their last trip. Determined to reunite with Alex, Poppy books a last-minute trip to Barcelona so she can attend his little brother’s wedding. Her hope is that she’ll be able to convince Alex to give their friendship another try.
Like any book-to-movie adaptation, some changes have been made in order to make it work for the not-so-big screen. Here are the ways that the film adaptation of People We Meet on Vacation differs from the book.
Alex and Poppy don’t go on as many vacations
The book, which is told from Poppy’s point of view, looks back at 10 summers that she and Alex spent together. No surprise, the movie had to nix a few locales—sorry, Nashville and Vail, Colorado—and therefore combine a few major plot points to keep this from becoming a four hour movie. (Though, perhaps like me, you may find yourself wondering, why isn’t this a One Day-like Netflix series?)
While some fans may not like that Alex and Poppy’s disastrous near-first kiss now happens in Tuscany instead of Croatia, the film does offer the pair, who often travel on an extremely tight budget in the novel, a much-deserved vacation upgrade.
The final act of Henry’s book takes place in Palm Springs, where everything that could possibily go wrong does: their cheap rental car gets a flat, their air conditioner goes on the fritz during a brutal heatwave, a fecal disaster shuts down the hotel pool, and they nearly die of heatstroke inside a (real) roadside dinosaur attraction.
In the movie, the two instead find themselves in Barcelona where Poppy still has issues with her hotel’s A/C, but it only makes her first makeout sesh with Alex that much steamier.
The movie leans way harder into the comedy
As an author, Emily Henry has a knack for writing witty banter that, dare we say, feels Ephron-esque. But the movie is going for laugh out loud moments that feel straight out of Anyone But You.
On Alex and Poppy’s first car ride together, a giant breakfast burrito doused in sour cream becomes a memorable sight gag—and a hilarious PSA for why you should never eat and drive. In Canada, Poppy’s hookup with a stoner water taxi driver (a pitch perfect Lukas Gage) is thwarted by an intense “memento mori” tattoo, which, in Latin, means, “remember that you must die.” (“I couldn’t stop thinking about my grandpa’s open casket funeral,” Poppy later tells Alex.) In New Orleans, Paula Abdul’s saxophone-laden hit “Forever Your Girl” becomes the soundtrack to a dance number that rivals Monica and Ross Geller’s legendary routine. Let’s just say Tom Blyth has got some moves.
However, the film’s silliest moment may just be Poppy’s mom (the tragically underused Molly Shannon) trying to give her daughter a 500 pack of condoms while Poppy’s dad (Succession’s Alan Ruck) has the sex talk with Alex, who thinks they’re talking about going on a plane for the first time. Can you say awkward?
Alex and Poppy’s significant others play a bigger role
In the book, Poppy’s boyfriends and Alex’s longtime on-again-off-again girlfriend Sarah stay mostly on the periphery. However, in the movie, they are major factors in why these two can’t seem to get out of the friendzone.
The love triangle is a go-to plot device for many rom-coms, but, in this case, it feels a little lazy. The book makes it clear that Alex and Poppy’s struggle to take the next step is not because they have partners waiting for them at home, but because they are too afraid to act on their true feelings.
Early in the book, Poppy talks about the what-if factor. “Ninety-five percent of the time, I see Alex Nilsen in a purely platonic way,” she reveals. “But for that other five percent of the time, there’s this what-if.” What if they kissed? What if they started dating? What if they broke up? The risk of losing him is far too great for Poppy to follow that little part of her that would like to be more than just friends with Alex.
The book puts readers inside of Poppy’s head, as she tries to understand why she’s so nervous to take the next step not only with Alex, but in her life and career. It’s only through therapy, a bit of soul-searching, and an unexpected run-in with her high school bully that she comes to understand why she’s so afraid of settling down: she’s worried she’s too much for anyone to truly love forever.
Unfortunately, the movie doesn’t seem as interested in Poppy’s interior life and like so many other rom-coms yadda yaddas her introspective journey, saving her biggest personal revelations for her final big romantic speech.
The end is slightly different — and very rom-com appropriate
After their hook-up in Barcelona, Alex worries that Poppy is not quite ready to commit and ends things before they even have a chance to begin. He believes that she sees him as only a vacation from her life, a short getaway until she finds something new and more exciting. His concerns force Poppy to think about what Alex really means to her and what she quickly realizes is that he is the only one she’d be willing to settle down with.
Like the book, the movie ends with Poppy heading to Ohio to tell Alex how she feels, but the film amps up her big romantic gesture. After resigning from her dream job as a travel reporter for a major New York magazine, she shows up at Alex’s door only to realize he’s not there. As she begins to walk away, she sees him heading out for a jog with a pair of the best noise-canceling headphones known to man, a clever callback to an earlier joke.
In order to reach him, she’s going to have to chase him down, quite literally. But, like the rom-com heroines before her—we’re looking at you Bridget Jones!—Poppy is willing to do one of the things she hates most in the world in order to get to him: run.
When she finally reaches him in the middle of a two-way street, she spills her guts in a speech that is largely taken from the book. “You’re not a vacation to me, Alex. You’re home,” she says through tears. “And I think I’m that for you, too.” Just like the book, the movie flashes ahead to next summer where we see Alex and Poppy building a life together in New York. She’s finally found a place where she can be entirely herself. She’s finally home.
So, is it worth watching?
For rom-com fans, the People We Meet on Vacation has a lot to offer. The movie’s stars, Bader and Bly, have great chemistry and make Poppy and Alex’s slow burn romance one worth rooting for. But this movie isn’t quite a When Harry Met Sally for a new generation. Much of the emotional depth of Henry’s book gets flattened in this adaptation that is a tad more focused on the com rather than the rom. That’s not a knock on the movie, a sweet friends to lovers romance that goes down extremely easy, it just means when the credits roll on People We Meet on Vacation, you might find yourself wanting to give the book another read.
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