Liebe auf Safari

I didn't realize until now the connection Lacey Chaubert and I have - we both have Cajun ancestry. I first saw her in "Party of Five", she was about 12 when it started. She stars in this movie, she was about 35 when it was filmed.

She plays Kira, a website designer living and working in Chicago. He has a relative in S. Africa, she had visited a couple of times as she was growing up but hadn't been there as an adult. Now she gets news he has died, she is in his will, she needs to travel to S. Africa for the reading of the will.

It turns out to be quite a shock, he wanted to keep his wildlife reserve, with elephants, lions, zebras, and other indigenous African animals, in the family so it was willed to Kira. She is a Chicago girl, she knows nothing about reserves and animals and she is certain she will not keep it. So her task is to find a buyer and sell it.

But this being a Hallmark movie, love will play a big role and as the story moves along Kira finds out what her priorities really are. My wife and I enjoyed it at home, streaming on Amazon Prime. Being a Hallmark movie it is clean, pleasant entertainment. Plus the cinematography in S. Africa is splendid!

Kira Slater (Lacey Chabert) is busy making websites from a Chicago office. She goes to South Africa to the reading of his beloved uncle's will although she hadn't seen him for a long while. To the shock of everybody, he left his safari reserve to her even though she hadn't been there since childhood. Tom Anderson is the head ranger and Ally Botsman is a ranger. Lwazi is the manager. Kira immediately gets an offer from a cookie cutter resort corporation. Tom is desperate to keep Kira from selling and decides to make her fall in love with him. It doesn't help that she has a boyfriend back in Chicago and she only wants to go home.

The only cool thing is the location. The scheme is very high school. The romance is nothing special. I love Lacey but the guy is a dud. He's more background actor than leading man. There is no heat and it fails in all the rom-com tropes. I don't understand the advantage of holding back the stepsiblings relationship. This movie is best on safari. I want the animals. I want more animals. I want the actors with the animals although they don't get much interactions. It's great to see the safari although it's not the level of a modern nature film. The romance isn't much. This is location, location, location.

She said at the beginning of the movie that she visited the reserve when she was five and then again when she was fourteen. Later on in the movie she said she fed the elephant when she was there at 10 years old.

The story was thin but that's not rare for Hallmark movies. The lead male actor was neither attractive nor a good actor and that was the main problem for me. There was no romantic energy in this film at all and I've seen Chabert strike sparks with a plethora of male leads. That bit of poor casting really cost this film.

The animals, the scenery, and the South African cast were wonderful. In fact.

The movie was okay. I loved the animals, the scenery and Africa, very beautiful! The bad thing is that the leads don't have chemistry at all, the male lead was not suited for Lacey, she is amazing as always, so she saved the movie. It's a movie worth watching one time!