Finding Emily – the hit new romcom that really romanticises Manchester

When news broke of a new romcom filmed and set in Manchester, forgive us for an eyebrow raise.

You see, when TV shows and films choose our city as a backdrop, it can sometimes get a little slapstick, a bit gimmicky, riddled with stereotypes (see: Jack Whitehall’s BRITs gags).

Either that, or the local sets are so aggressively styled for the screen, they’re barely recognisable as Manchester anymore (see: every Harlan Coben drama).

But then we kept catching glimpses of the Finding Emily cast and crew around town a couple of years ago, taking over iconic boozers and milling around legendary gig venues, and that sceptical eyebrow came down a peg or two.

So imagine our delight after seeing the film and finding a well-researched, authentically Manc, love letter to our city that actually romanticses what it’s like to live here in the present day – not a Hacienda stripe in sight.

The plot of Finding Emily follows Owen (Spike Fearn) on his mission to track down ‘Emily’, a girl he met on a night out who mistakenly wrong-numbered him, with the help of another Emily (Angourie Rice).

Throughout the film, the duo drink, dance, and dig for clues in all corners of the city, with backdrops that will be very familiar to those of us who live here.

There’s a bar crawl all along Canal Street, including a drag cabaret show at VIA; a job hunt in Piccadilly Records; a queue joined outside Rustica.

We see scenes set inside some of Manchester’s most beautiful spaces, like the Whitworth Cafe and the Sackville Street Building, and plenty of iconic cityscapes like the view from Deansgate station and the backdrop of the University of Manchester.

They even play darts in the Peveril of the Peak.

Finding Emily romanticises the less glamorous, more authentic side of the city too – Northern Quarter alleyways, a Fallowfield house party, a proper kebab on the Curry Mile, and an all-nighter in the Central Library.

While a lot of film crews hop over to leafy Didsbury to house their characters, our lead figures in the film instead live in terraces beneath the viaducts in Smedley, or in a converted mill apartment in Chorlton Mill.

It’s not only the location scouts that put in the work on Finding Emily – there’s also a respectable number of local characters and artists who pop up with cameos.

Antony Szmierek features heavily on the soundtrack, and appears in-person in the closing credits.

There’s a video game played by Owen’s brother with graphics designed by celebrated local artist Stanley Chow.

Anna Phylactic performs on stage on Canal Street, W.H. Lung headline a gig at Night & Day, Luke Una stands behind the decks as a disgruntled ‘No requests’ type of DJ, and Stockport’s beloved Blossoms perform at the cast’s graduation ball.

I’m not sure we’ve ever seen a film or TV show so perfectly capture Manchester before, celebrating all its beauty and all its edges. It’s not performative at all.

If you’re a Manchester local, Finding Emily is a must-watch. But even if you’re not, this is a modern romcom with likeable characters and plenty of charm.

It hits cinemas on Friday 22 May.

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Featured image: Matt Squire / © 2026 FOCUS FEATURES LLC