A Royal in Paradise

Every once in a while, a film comes along that looks like it will be a formulaic love story. One watches it for the soothing rewards of knowing the girl will get the guy, the guy wilt get the girl, and it will all end happily..And then, once in a while, this formula comes along with some really appealing leads, an intelligent story, and a bit more to offer than the conventional script. This movie was one of those.

It was filmed in a beautiful setting, using ample time to show the colorful, charming tropical location. There were underwater scenes, stunning fish and sea life shown, and in all, it was a visually gratifying movie.

The love story was mature, each of the leading characters had his and her own issues to deal with . Of course, the prince needed to take the throne. And, of course, he was expected to marry someone of royal lineage. Surely, the young woman author had a deadline and writer's block, and needed to find a new location to inspire her creative work. But there was more to this formula than one would expect. Serious life issues were shared and discussed by the young couple. Failures and disappointments were talked about. One knows in watching a movie of this sort that the ending will be a happy one. Everything will turn out alright. But this film explored the roadblocks and impediments along the way in a more mature and realistic way.

If one can make a few comments about some shortcomings, here they are. While the female lead wore some stunniing clothes, it seemed gratuitous that there was so much cleavage shown. It was almost as if everything she wore was cut too low and her cleavage was far too exposed. The same is true for her best friend, roommate. There was barely one scene that did not have that very distracting and unnecessary aspect to it. What was the purpose of this sort of exposure? It distracted from the story, from the sensitive relationship and how it was resolved. There was an almost Playboy centerfold aspect to the need to show so much cleavage. Was there a reason behind this? It's hard to imagine what that reason would be. Other than that one distraction, this is a mature, lovely story.

8.0 stars.

My review will be influenced primarily by a woman surnamed Fish. I love everything she does, she has the Midas touch. I've yet to watch any performance by her that leaves me cold or disappointed. Once again, we have a title debacle. What is the real title of this film? Who cares, I'm not going to make a big deal of it.

The writing is straight out of Hallmark's playbook. This might as well be a Hallmark. Heck, it probably is, but maybe they decided to give another channel a go at the whole royal-meets-commoner trope. Bad move guys, because this is one of the better royal romances of the dozens I've seen. I'd say this places i my top five thus far. I won't bore you with the plot, but just lay out the basic blueprint of this royal installment vs all others, and see where it lands in the grand scheme of royalty.

First: instead of the usual setting of a big city in America (even though it begins there), we end up on an island paradise. Is this in the Caribbean, is this a real island? I never researched it. But it looks like something south of, or near the equator.

Second: the prince opts to hide his identity from the commoner.

Third: the commoner is a successful writer, dating guru, or owner of a thriving business.

Fourth: the royal has an "evil" king or queen who is barking orders and having someone spy on them to be sure they aren't galavanting with an uncivilized American.

Fifth: the royal's assistant is part of the plot and ends up escorting, or dating the American love interest's best friend. And there is someone named Winston, whether an assistant, a butler, or bodyguard.

Sixth: the king or queen is also dating a lower level citizen in secret.

Seventh: when the identity of the royal is revealed, the other person gets very angry and breaks off the friendship because they were "misled" or "lied to", and they exclaim in great disappointment: "I trusted you". What was very refreshing in this particular instance, she is pragmatic and understands the situation and the pressures, and holds no grudge for his deceit.

Eighth: the king or queen persuades the commoner to break up with the royal, because the relationship would cheat said royal out of his/her rightful lot in life.

They could have mixed this up a bit, instead of him learning her identity as a famous author, keep that little secret from him for another 20 minutes, so both of them are masquerading. That would have been very interesting, maybe she finds out he's a prince and he discovers she's an author and they both keep it a secret, pretending all the while that they are still in the dark. Maybe incorporate quips, and comments, and puns and then the reveal and we all have a blast. They both knew that they knew, it could be funny for a moment.

As an author, I'm always intrigued when they include a character in these movies who is also an author. Sadly, they very seldom make enough of that, and that's the case here. It would be interesting to get more of "the story of the story" on screen, instead of simply having the character be blocked and then suddenly they can write again because they got happier.

The first half of the movie is better than the second half, and that's not unusual in these made for cable romances, either. As the characters meet and get to know each other, the story is lively and at times amusing. After they get to know each other and things settle in, I thought it got kind of boring.

And of course, they HAD to throw in the "Queen wants to crush the romance" trope. Haven't we seen that time and again over the last decade?

Your typical commoner girl (this time a writer with writer's block) recently dumped and a "typical" prince who happen to meet on this beautiful marine preserve and the rest is predictable. This movie has a slightly different bent in which the reveal happens earlier than usual and the resulting dilemma takes more time to resolve while the writer is confronted with more of a intellectual problem than usual. The scenery is gorgeous, and the pacing is competently presented. For those interested in the by now well-used rom-com story with a little more bite, this movie has all elements that romantics have come to expect and a tad bit more.

Two Australians - Rhiannon Fish as Olivia and Mitchell Bourke as Alexander - star in a film shot in Queensland, Australia for GAC Family.

A Royal in Paradise tells the story of Olivia, a best-selling writer who goes through a breakup whilst struggling for inspiration for her next novel. When Olivia's friend suggests they take the trip Olivia had originally planned to take with her boyfriend, she meets Alexander of Toravia (yet another country where they sound English!), who is on the island for a fundraising benefit, and to get away from the constraints of royal life. If you've seen one of these, you've seen them all...and you wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that sparks fly between the two, and that's where complications set in. All with a tropical backdrop, and all very family-friendly. (Except, if you happen to pay very close attention to the stock footage scenes of people in the pool, as I apparently did. Some of them are wearing thong bikinis! And Olivia does show off a fairly impressive bit of cleavage on a few occasions.)

Fish and Bourke have good chemistry, and their scenes together are all very nice. A predictable plot doesn't mean this wasn't an enjoyable film. What makes it enjoyable is their chemistry.