Once again, Hallmark takes us to a romantic location, in the intent to add flavor to an otherwise unoriginal love story. This time is wonderful Venice, and the production creates a better feeling of authenticity than that seen in other cultural salads recently proposed to their viewers. Amy enrolls in Venetian Chef Marcello Favero's, erroneously listed as Marcello Barone in these credits, culinary course, trying to obtain his collaboration in the production of a ready made health food line her company would produce. Their interaction generates reciprocal attraction, with predictable outcome. The movie provides a generally realistic feeling of every day life in Venice and offers ample views of the unique beauties of the city and the surrounding landscapes. The chemistry between the lead characters feels genuine and the overall romantic story is reasonably sweet. As an Italian born viewer, yet, I cannot help pointing out details that stray from a real Venetian experience and suggests, once more, that Hallmark productions do not spend enough efforts in understanding cultures and, one way or another, miss the veracity mark. As the movie was actually filmed in Venice, would it have been so difficult to avail of real Venetian consulting and or acting support?
For one, it is , at least, strange that a great Venetian Chef would include making pizza as one of the tasks in a short culinary course. Then, the accent of the Chef, purportedly of true Venetian descent, is markedly central-Italian, including his rendition of the English language, which is surprising, as the actor was, reportedly, raised in London. The few street or marked vendors seen in the movie do, also, speak Italian with a heavy southern accent. Nearly not a single person appearing in the movie shows any Venetian inflection. The background music seems the choice of an American with southern-Italian origins and would be more appropriate for a plot cast in, let's say, Naples.
I found particularly horrifying the scenes of an Italian Chef sampling long-cut pasta dishes by filling his mouth with huge forkfuls, sucking it up, Chinese-style, biting the edges off and spitting them in the plate. Any minimally educated Italian would pick a moderate quantity and roll it well on the fork, so it would easily fit in the mouth, and would consider any other way as bovine, bad manners.
These details aside, the film is fairly entertaining and the photography is attractive enough. The production is simple, with good sentiments and nothing objectionable, making it a suitable viewing for the entire family.
