Eilidh and Cameron go on their first date three months into her pregnancy. They spend far more time buying clothes and equipment for the baby than they do dating. It is a lovely piece of comic timing: the ordinary milestones of a relationship have arrived in the wrong order, and neither flatmate can pretend that a promising evening out is their biggest decision. Kevin Walls builds Premature around that reversal. Eilidh and Cameron have to consider a shared future before they know how to behave as a couple.
Their uncertainty comes through when Eilidh asks if they will remain buddies or become something else. Cameron has an answer for the career he has spent years planning, but no comparable plan for her. Played by James Rottger, he is a finance graduate carrying student debt through an unrewarding job, with an interview for the position he wants finally in sight. Elle Watson’s Eilidh has left art school and works as a barista.
The pregnancy follows an encounter between the flatmates that neither expected to change their lives. She initially indicates she will not continue it, then decides to keep the baby. Cameron’s dismay has a recognizable source in the interview and the years of effort behind it; Eilidh’s decision has to be allowed its own uncertainty too.
I like how often Walls lets practical business reveal the relationship. Baby clothes and equipment take up space that another romantic comedy might give to dates. Cameron is embarrassed by the thought that Eilidh’s failure to take the morning-after pill could mean their encounter was forgettable.
It is a small joke, but Rottger and Watson make that awkwardness feel close to the way these two communicate. Later, an embrace is interrupted when Cameron notices Eilidh bleeding. Affection does not make the fear of losing the pregnancy disappear. Both moments let a change in their circumstances alter the tone of an exchange without requiring a speech about how frightened they are.
The film also has a place for that everyday unease. Walls, who wrote and photographed his directorial debut on a reported £16,000 budget, gives Glasgow a visible presence, including Kelvingrove and the city’s architecture. The setting suits two people whose lives are defined by work, rent, and plans that have stopped fitting together. Watson and Rottger play their attraction with an appealing lack of polish. Their hesitation does much of the work that a grand romantic gesture would have done in a glossier film.
That restraint makes the second-hand cot episode especially strange. After another buyer gets the cot Eilidh wanted, she proposes disguises and breaking into the buyer’s home to steal it. Cameron’s attempt to see the scheme as proof of her devotion to their child gives the scene an affectionate angle, and Eilidh has shown she can be impulsive.
Even so, the break-in asks Watson to switch from grounded uncertainty to an outsized comic mode with little preparation. The film’s smaller jokes, including the third flatmate’s reluctant departure, have better timing because they grow from people inconveniencing one another. Here the situation seems to demand a different Eilidh for a few minutes.
It exposes a wider imbalance. Cameron’s doubts are tied repeatedly to choices the film has established, particularly his long pursuit of a stable career. Eilidh’s change of mind about the pregnancy needs no tidy explanation, but the writing gives Watson less opportunity to explore what that decision costs her or how she understands it. The cot scheme briefly supplies her with an emphatic action in place of that exploration. Watson keeps Eilidh engaging, though the performance has to bridge a gap the screenplay leaves open.
Andrew Rodger has a quieter, better supported role as Cameron’s father. He speaks about the retirement he imagined with his wife before her early death changed it. The point about planning is direct, perhaps too direct, but Rodger gives Cameron someone whose advice comes from a life that refused to follow its intended course. Some of Eilidh and Cameron’s later decisions arrive too quickly. In his conversation with Cameron, though, a change in direction has the weight of lived experience: Cameron must hear what became of a life planned just as carefully as his own.
Premature was released in UK cinemas on September 18, 2026. Set in Glasgow, the romantic comedy follows two flatmates who must navigate their future together after an impulsive one-night stand leads to an unexpected pregnancy.
Full Credits
Title: Premature
Distributor: Sonorous Films
Release date: September 18, 2026 (United Kingdom)
Rating: 15
Running time: 1 hour 29 minutes (89 minutes)
Director: Kevin Walls
Writers: Kevin Walls
Producers and Executive Producers: Kevin Walls, Paul Luebke, Lucas A. Ferrara
Cast: James Rottger, Elle Watson, Gail Watson, Andrew Rodger, Terry Nelson, Zoë Lerman
Director of Photography (Cinematographer): Kevin Walls
Editors: William Robertson
Composer: Roma Yagnik
The Review
Premature
Kevin Walls gives the romantic comedy a clever change of order: Eilidh and Cameron face parenthood before learning how to be a couple. Elle Watson and James Rottger make that awkwardness warm and believable, while Glasgow and Cameron’s father give their choices a lived-in setting. The cot break-in strains Eilidh’s characterization, and the script gives Cameron’s doubts clearer development than hers. The quieter scenes show how much this modest film can do when it trusts its characters.
PROS
- A first date that arrives three months into pregnancy
- Warm, awkward chemistry between Watson and Rottger
- Glasgow’s presence and Rodger’s grounded performance
CONS
- The cot break-in jars with the gentler comedy
- Eilidh’s perspective receives less development
- Some later decisions come too quickly
