First Love 2022

Amid the heavy chill of the 2008 economic recession, senior high school student Jim Albright Chris Galust watches his father Greg Albright Jeffrey Donovan lose his bank job, a blow that compounds the family’s already tight finances. Jim makes a quiet, practical choice: if he can either help raise money or secure some kind of college ride for track, he’ll pursue it with quiet resolve.

In the school library, Jim locks himself into a narrow window of time—about 20 minutes—to finish a paper. It’s there that he spots Ann Matienzo Sydney Park on the far side of a bookcase, and later he sees her rehearsing a theatrical play in the auditorium. A shy, almost tentative curiosity pulls him in her direction. For their first real conversation, Jim fabricates a reason to pull Ann from her Spanish class, presenting a phony note from a school administrator so he can speak with her alone. He’s awkward but sincere, praising her eyes and the space they share.

After class, Ann asks for a ride, and Jim doesn’t take her straight home. Instead, they drive to a pretty overlook above the ocean, where they talk, laugh, and simply be together. When Ann slips in late, her mother asks what kept her, and Ann explains that she’s spending time with someone new. Her mom, not wanting to pry, assumes something casual and gives a warm, permissive nod.

Meanwhile, Greg pursues opportunities with an employment recruiter, and Kay faces the practical and emotional challenge of caring for Aunt Irene Diane Venora. Rehousing Irene becomes a delicate matter: Kay suggests a home, but the plan goes over badly. Irene reminds Kay that she practically raised her—while Kay’s sister abandoned her—before she ends up being asked to leave temporarily, a blow that rattles the whole family.

That night, Kay’s brother—bragging about how busy he and his wife are—speaks bluntly about Greg’s layoff, implying it was deserved for a white-collar worker. The family’s tensions simmer beneath a veneer of ordinary life, underscoring the economic squeeze they’re all feeling.

At Ann’s birthday party, a dare game puts Jim in a moment of bold vulnerability: he must kiss Ann while she’s blindfolded, and she rates him a perfect ten. Later, among friends at school, some tease that Jim is a bit odd, but Ann admits that she likes him nonetheless.

Their relationship deepens. Jim invites Ann to meet his family for dinner, and they spend an afternoon with friends and colleagues during a milestone—his parents’ 21st anniversary—where they become more intimate. After that moment, Jim tells Ann he loves her, a confession that changes the pace of their bond.

Over dinner, Ann’s mom voices a cautious view: she fears the relationship may be fleeting, urging Ann to stay open to college possibilities in NYC. Jim, wounded but honest, suggests they take things as they come, while Ann hints at a need to keep things light. The two drift apart for a time, graduate, and then face family upheaval when Jim’s grandmother passes away and his parents downsize because Greg remains unemployed. In that moment, Jim seeks advice from his dad about Ann, and Greg’s reply—“if it is meant to be, it will be”—lingers in the air.

Two years pass before Jim revisits his parents’ apartment. Greg continues to take on odd jobs to keep things afloat, and Kay opens up to Jim about how low everyone feels. Ann leaves a voicemail expressing interest in reconnecting, and when they meet again, they discover that neither has found a lasting new relationship. They rekindle their closeness and intimacy, and Ann confesses that she has always loved Jim and wonders about what could come next.

A new circle of decisions arrives when Jim buys an engagement ring and Kay stumbles upon it, attempting to dissuade him. He asks Ann’s mother for her blessing to propose at Ann’s graduation—a gesture that her mother, though skeptical, recognizes as sincere. In parallel, Greg secures a new job with a Phoenix-based company but contemplates a move abroad that would change the family’s future.

The story resolves with a simple, heartfelt wedding and reception for Jim and Ann, underscored by Greg’s earnest plea to hold on to the most important moments life offers.

In the end, love persists through hardship, doubt, and time, turning a cautious romance into a lifelong bond that weathered the recession’s strain and the family’s trials.