The Wedding Pact

Okay, this movie failed on several levels: originality, structure, acting, casting, photography. Those were the aspects that caught my eye. The first third was just plain boring and stupid. But as the movie progressed, it became increasingly over-the-top idiotic and I actually enjoyed it.

I recently watched "Love, Rosie" with Lily Collins and Sam Claflin, which really wasn't much better but it had nice production design and the two main characters had good chemistry, and overall everyone just looked pretty. That movie knew that it had nothing new to say, but it was at least attractive. "The Wedding Pact" failed at this completely (with the exception of Haylie Duff). Why did they cast a man in his forties to portray a college student and then the same character in his early thirties? Why did they give him the world's worse wig to make him look like a freshman? What was with the aging bed'n'breakfast hostess giving subtle signs of nymphomania? And certain scenes were framed and edited poorly, drawing attention to this or that detail that actually had nothing to do with the scene. I wouldn't label this movie as "ugly," but at times it looked painfully fatuous.

Then we had the scenes that popped out of nowhere, and/or went on too long. The scene where Mitch and Elizabeth talk about a hot dog buffet they attended in college, and Mitch actually spells out that three hot dogs are fewer than twenty-seven hot dogs. The scene where the girl in the tube top pops into Mitch's car and her boyfriend follows her, and Mitch acts like a relationship counselor (is that his job? what is his job??). The towel whipping duel. The "Heaven's Angels" cult. The mix-up with Elizabeth's address so that Mitch almost gets on a plane to Hawaii. The Coppola-esque scene between Jake and his rich, domineering father. Where were these scenes supposed to go? Some of them seemed like they just existed for the sake of one punchline, or one jump-scare, or just forced exposition to tell the audience how we are supposed to feel about a certain character.

I have seen worse acting, but there was not one performance here I would call "good." The story was about these two star-crossed lovers who are made for each other but keep missing each other, surprise, shock, surprise, shock. It touched all the time-worn bases: the moment of attraction, the realization that it's love, the painful inability to express that love, the determination to come together, the rekindling, the conflict, the breakup, the reconciliation. I know you know this already, I just cannot believe they still make movies that actually go through all of these ancient steps with so little variation. Even Jane Austen would ask people to switch it up a bit.

But I give this movie 5/10, because in the last third, I laughed out loud several times. After a certain point the script stopped trying to make sense, and events just happened whether they had any reason to or not. I will admit this movie also had a few legitimately funny moments. Kelly Perine was probably the best casting decision, although his character often had nothing to work with. And, I will say it again, Haylie Duff looked attractive. I could see some careful attention to her makeup and wardrobe; I wish they had given the same amount of attention to the photography, or the acting (or any sense of logic in the story itself, but we all know that's not going to happen).

I do look for more in a movie. But in a world where big-budget bad movies pander to an audience they can count on (i.e. "Disaster Movie," "The Emoji Movie"), this low-budget bad movie was inane in an amusing way.

This film had absolutely no storyline, no budget, no actors worth watching. The parts that were supposed to be funny just weren't - not only because of the bad jokes but also due to bad performances of all the actors. Acting wise, I felt like watching a porn movie just without the naked people. The dog was the best actor in the whole film. This review has to be at least 10 lines long to be submitted, and to be honest there is absolutely NOTHING left to say about this movie to fill up that space. But to give some examples: the way the characters met was completely random, the fake wig of the main character in his college outfit was just too obvious. The poor attempt to make the movie more 'artsy' by moving back and forth in time doesn't work, just seems like the editor was asleep himself while trying to edit this film. Maybe that's due to the extremely slow pace of this film in general and especially the first 15 minutes. Watch this movie only when you're into masochistic activities... can't wait for the sequel...

At the time of this writing, there is one other review giving the movie 10/10. Yikes! What we have here is a very light rom-com with good actors, a lot of clichés and some significant improbabilities in the story. However, it is inoffensive, it has high production values and looks very good, and there are a few chuckles along the way. You won't get any spoilers from me, but we all know how this will turn out.

If you go in expecting anything more than harmless light entertainment, you will be very disappointed. If, however, you are looking for 90 minutes of easy fluff that you could watch with your niece and your Gran, you are in business. Special commendation to Buddy the dog, played skillfully by Hooligan the dog.

Choosing the marriage partner is something that can tell a lot about a person. It would be best to get it all, a warm and generous personality, strong and honest character, loyalty, impressive intellect, a knock-out appearance, sophisticated mannerism and last, tolerable age difference, and last, but sadly not the least, financial security. The trouble is that it is winning a jack pot is near impossible most of the time. What happens when one needs to compromise? Well, like thousands of other pictures, this one deals with exactly that.

Now about the movie itself. The storyline is highly predictable, the characters are shallow and the parody on real life does not really work in this movie. So, the burning questions would be why bother watching it? If you feel mentally and physically exhausted, but do not feel like sleeping or surfing the net for latest gossip, this movie could do. Otherwise, it is a total waste of time. This could be said about most rom-coms though.

What a refreshing change for my husband and me to sit down with our teenage daughter and what a romantic comedy that is free of gratuitous sex, nudity and foul language.

The story is simple, the characters genuine and it had a lot of appeal to the romantic mind of my 16 year old who completely believes in true love and happily ever after. Yes, the story is cliché but it recognizes it in a humorous way. Although my husband found it to be a bit juvenile, definitely more "made for TV", he agreed that is was a cute movie and applauded Chris Soldevilla's performance saying he was likable and could picture him on a sitcom. However, if not for the beautiful Angie Everhart he probably would not have watched it at all.

I felt the pairing of Haylie Duff and Chris Soldevilla as the main characters to be believable and everyone for the most part was well cast. Scott Michael Campbell as the fiancé did a great job at making you dislike him. In every movie there should be one person you love to hate and for me it was him. Great acting on his part.

I especially liked that this writer/director took a higher road and wrote from the heart instead of his privates. Of course there is enough sexual innuendo to keep things interesting but you can still watch it with kids and keep your morals in tact.

In my opinion, its a good movie for a girl's night and is completely appropriate for mother/daughter night, a sleepover party, a casual date or a group of ladies looking to chill with a glass of wine and a nice film. It offers a funny perspective of love from the man's point of view while appealing to a woman's romantic side.

Overall, I say grab some popcorn and a spot of the sofa and rent this movie