Este Haim Co-Scores the Score for Will Gluck’s Government-Mandated Celibacy Rom-Com

Rom-coms have long relied on unshakeable pop soundtracks to sell their fantasy. Less common is watching a musician known for slinking indie-rock riffs build a score around a premise in which Congress outlaws premarital sex, enforced by biosensors implanted in every adult. That’s the odd, disorienting setting of One Night Only, the new Will Gluck film that quietly recruited Este Haim and frequent collaborator Christopher Stracey to handle the music.

The movie’s dystopian conceit — one legally sanctioned night each year to break the mandate — could easily drift into heavy-handed satire or grim world-building. Instead, the score threads a “dreamy” atmosphere through the chaos, with dance-pop needle drops that frame the night as both absurd and tender. Haim’s ear for pop concision, sharpened over a decade with her sisters in HAIM, translates into a glossy undercurrent that never undercuts the film’s unease. It’s a deft balancing act: the music signals romance while the script suggests something closer to a cautionary surrender.

The shift into scoring is a logical but not overdue move for Haim, who has long moved between indie-rock precision and mainstream pop architecture. Working alongside Stracey — known for his pop production and previous Gluck collaboration — she leans into synthetic textures and glittering hooks that sit comfortably outside her band’s usual palette. The film may invite questions it won’t answer, but the score is a reminder that even the most unsettling stories can sound like a love letter.