Conseils d'amour

5.1 stars.

Not quite certain what I'm watching. The quality seems like a soap opera. I notice UP network does films with this sort of digital quality, not sure what it is, but I feel like I should know. And what is happening with the awkward dialogue? It feels like a low budget romance produced and performed by amateurs. It is a good attempt at something, but if you are going to make a B movie, try doing something that is exciting and entertaining. Making a failed attempt at a romantic comedy on low budget tends to be risky. Add to all that, the music wasn't helpful.

The lead female is gorgeous and is likely very popular, even famous in her country of origin. I haven't researched her, but just guessing in her primary language, she might be talented. Unfortunately, her English skills need some work. But she has a smokey attractiveness that makes it difficult to stop the movie and move on with my day. Okay, I made it about 40 minutes, and that's all I can tolerate, so I skipped to the last 7 minutes and I couldn't even finish that last scent. It was so bad, even at the end. If there is a kiss, I don't care. Peace out.

Most of the acting was bad including some of the less significant roles. Sarah Malfara as Serena was either a horrible actor or more likely she was directed to be far too shallow and condescending and, well, totally annoying. It might have been a little of both. The Serena character was so bad, it distracted from the entire movie. It would have been more effective if she was a little more subtle, but still demanding. Tyler Harlow was also bad. The character was fine, but Harlow suffered from what I sometimes say about less experienced actors - he seemed like he was making an effort to deliver the lines. They weren't coming out naturally. Rachel Vallori was OK as Abby. Her character was likeable.

It is hard to imagine how Abby and Serena's situation got started in the first place given how much Serena depended on her. It was more than the fact she was demanding. This becomes clear during the scene where Jack was present while Serena was doing the show and Abby was feeding her lines.

The story wasn't that much different from a typical rom/com where a reporter spends a lot of time with a subject of his article, except that in this case Abby was a stand-in for Serena for a while. It wasn't hard to figure out how things would progress to the end.

I didn't notice any significant sound or technical issues.

Another day and another TV movie co-produced between Reel One Entertainment and Sunshine Films which means a lot of technical issues. There was an obligatory loud background music in several scenes so you can barely hear what cast talk. Music was overall weird - there are clasicall ROE tracks which you instantly recognize as they use them for years which is not bad because I like most of them but it was mixed with a typical Sunshine Films music and it was so out of place.

The main issue is the poor dialogue audio recording, and the main lead, Rachel Vallori suffered mostly from it. I don't know, like they used cell phone to record her or microphone was far away, it's just outright bad. I mean it's not the ROE TV movie with the worst technical issues, but they are still noticable.

I updated my review and raised score by one point because I watched movie again as I initially missed very important thing which lowered score. Incoming updated part.

Cast is pretty good. Finally Hispanic as the main lead - Cuban model, Rachel Vallori. I don't know why her name in the movie is Abby Reug which is definitely not Hispanic. And to make it even worse, her movie sister is also Hispanic and she also doesn't have Hispanic name (Brynn)! But she actually said to Jack that she was born and raised in Cuba and immigrated 10 years ago so there is it.

I'm highly disappointed as without technical issues, and if two Hispanic actresses had Hispanic names as they should, it would be easy low budget 7* romance TV movie.

And obligatory don't watch trailer because it's ROE and they always compress whole movie full of spoilers into it.

I had absolutely no problem with the storyline, and honestly, most of the actors were very good and believable. However, I feel maybe I should be writing this to the movie's director. I don't understand how you could let the woman who played Abby's boss be so extremely one dimensional and typecast. The fact that everyone else was trying to be authentic and worked on their character's desires and personalities made her stand out so much more obviously fake. And because she was featured in most of the scenes in the film made it much harder to watch. There are ways to play a difficult, demanding, phony, and unappreciative boss without being so over the top that it ruins any possibility in believing the character. Too bad. With the right actress or direction, it might've been a very nice piece.