The more it gets away from the non linear aspect in the second half the more it feels like just another solid mid budget cancer movie, nevertheless it's made in an authentic way by the Brooklyn director John Crowley and Garfield and Pugh are both great with the latter giving one of her best performances. Making it about a truly talented person with Pugh's chef skill gives it an interesting dynamic of how someone like that accepts dying before reaching their full potential/recognition, especially since she had a second talent in figure skating earlier in her life that she felt she wasted. Her character not removing both ovaries just to have kid she barely even wanted before was crazy decision, but makes sense with the rest of her arc that she never wanted to sacrifice parts of her life for cancer. Meanwhile Garfield is in the position of knowing he's the less special married partner, and the family is the only thing he really has in a way it can't be for her.