Produced by John Legend, Southside With You takes a step into the past, the summer of 1989 that is, to look at the beginning of a blossoming relationship between Barack and Michelle Obama.

Actor Parker Sawyers plays the young Barack Obama who is an intern at a corporate law firm on his summer break away from Harvard Law School. Actress Tika Sumpter plays the role of Michelle Robinson, a stubborn attorney at the same law firm in Chicago.

This law firm is where the they first met and Robinson agrees to accompany Obama to a meeting on the other end of Chicago but she makes it very clear that it isn’t a date – at first.

The film continues and discusses an issue concerning Robinson having to face being not only a woman attorney within this corporate law firm but being a black woman attorney within this large corporate law firm.

The film also digs into how the city of Chicago ignored the southside of the city whenever they plead for something like a community center or a park, touching upon the idea of racism during this time period.  Obama addresses his neighbors within a church on the southside while Robinson watches in awe as he speaks and convinces people to think of things differently.

The reviews for Southside With You are positive and high with an overall 88% score on Rotten Tomatoes.  The film made 2.9 million in the box office within its first two weeks hitting theaters.

I think that the film was not just a simple love story based upon the president and first lady’s dating life, but a compelling, realistic romance that catches viewers attention and draws them into the drama and situations that Obama and Robinson faced that first day.

Southside With You cleverly avoids the topic of the now married Obamas’ current presidential state and instead takes an in-depth look into where it all began.