A fluffy but fun telling of a rags to riches story.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
Los Angeles Times by Annlee Ellingson
Director David Frankel has crafted a sweet, funny, heartfelt film, and while we may know all along how it all turns out, Paul's signature performance still gives us chills.
Time Out London by Cath Clarke
The problem with the film is that Potts’s life story has been put through the Hollywood meatgrinder. Awkward details have been changed or erased – they’ve made Potts Welsh (he grew up in Bristol) and eliminated his siblings.
The Guardian by Catherine Shoard
The movie is strongest is when it strips away the facts and focuses on the emotional notes.
Village Voice by Chris Packham
The film shoehorns Potts's life story into a familiar underdog template, populating the world with near-mythological threshold guardians who exist to assure the hero that he isn't good enough.
The Hollywood Reporter by David Rooney
An utterly formulaic but sweet movie that does what a crowd-pleaser is meant to do.
The film fictionalizes his life story so aggressively that it’s no less (or more) entertaining than the average rom-com.
Potts does the singing himself, but that doesn’t stop Justin Zackham’s (The Big Wedding) contrived script from sounding bum notes throughout.
What keeps One Chance plugging along almost in spite of itself are the warmly engaging performances of Corden and Alexandra Roach.
For all the solid efforts of the cast, it’s still one of those biopics with a totally canned story arc and as many head-slapping moments as intentional laughs.