The Wedding Veil Inspiration

This second sequel to the Wedding Veil trilogy continues the story of Emma (Autumn Reeser), who is back at work while her husband is opening a lace store in Chicago.

The main stories are about husband Paolo (Paolo Bernardini) needing to return home to Italy to care for his father, and Emma's relationship with her boss, who says she wants Emma to succeed her when she retires.

While there is some romance for another couple in this story, this episode lacks inspiration, primarily due to the relationship between Emma and boss Nancy (Lynda Boyd), which is toxic. Later, the viewer is asked to overlook Nancy's disrespect and nastiness for a silly reason. The film is a fail for this reason alone.

I LOVED this particular installment of the Veil series! It made me feel total love once again for Autumn Reeser, and let's completely admit that Kacey Rohl (sp) is an absolute keeper for Hallmark. PLEASE make more movies with her!

This movie is all about the fact that Emma and Paolo are now married and living in Chi-town, although P. Has strong ties with his family back home in Italy. He is struggling with that familiar battle most of us encounter at some point: how to handle aging family members that need us, while we attempt to live the life we've worked hard to achieve. It's not an easy decision, and when siblings are involved, it is both easier and more difficult: easier to share the load, but more difficult because you risk not doing enough to bear your part of the responsibility.

I digress, but I get Paolo's struggle.

Emma is a capable and driven art historian who is working as a prof at the university. She is in it for the right reasons, but her department head/boss bypasses all of Emma's passion in order to neatly fill her own position so she can retire.

Emma's TA and friend, Lily, is so expressive and interesting. She serves as a foil to Emma's own perfectionistic tendencies, and brings a reality to the plot that Hallmark is often criticized for lacking. I love when Lily earnestly admits to disliking Emma's article, and I personally had a death-by-cuteness moment anytime there were 'Charlotte' moments!

I agree that Paolo had a certain insistence about him that could be a bit off-putting. I felt something sad when seeing Emma's face as she said "I thought I was your family". That is actually a familiar line to me in my own personal life, so it hit home. Still, I know that nothing in life is linear/perfect.

My conclusion about Emma's choice to do what she did is that she lives according to her real values and passion. We all have different motivations, and it's unfair to say that women "ought" to feel any specific way about their careers or pursuits. It is possible to reframe your goals, just as the movie astutely illustrated with the "5 year plan": the writers clearly were answering the viewer's future criticisms of Emma 'selling out' when they referred to her 5-year plan. Just because we make a plan doesn't mean that we cannot bend, budge or change those plans. It doesn't make Emma weak, and it doesn't put her at risk of any specific negative outcome.

If the worst happens, and we end up realizing that we sacrificed our own interests to support our partners', we adapt and survive. All is not lost. It's just part of our story, and there is no 'right' way to live.

All the other parts and scenes were excellent to me; I had a little difficulty placing the reasoning behind Lily's sudden 'job' at the lace shop, but I was overthinking. She was simply helping out because she saw a need to step in, and this was addressed when she talked about her parents' store back home.

I loved Carlo Marks - he is pretty adorable and deserves more roles. I also loved Lacey and Alison's appearances, of course.

The title of my review is actually a nod to Emma's true ability to speak her mind. In the scene discussing pizza, Paolo is pretty insistent that his version is the only "real" pizza - but Emma/Autumn's confidence when she says "no, it IS pizza" is, well, fire!

Perhaps it is because I'm worn out from the common Christmas movie plots, but I enjoyed this movie. And it wasn't quite the usual non Christmas plot even though it is predictable and has a very low level of tension. Emma's trials are not that different than anyone who has a demanding boss. There is a small twist at the end and I did wonder if that was the case before it got there.

I really enjoyed Kacey Rohl as Lilly. She had good chemistry with Carlo Marks. I wondered if the age difference was a bit much especially since Lilly is a grad student with Rohl seemingly playing below her real age. Still, Lilly is a very appealing character and keeps Emma going while having her own joy of life. Charlotte adds a little bit of spice also.

Emma and Paolo are my favorite couple from the The Wedding Veil series. I LOVED their first movie when they met and married, and I LOVED this sequel to their story. Their on-screen chemistry is amazing making their love story so engaging to watch. I loved Paolo's commitment to his family and the family business and how the couple dealt with their career issues. I would love to see their storyline continue in future movies!

I also loved the Lily/Matteo storyline. They both were such refreshing characters to watch, especially Lily. Their story was so realistic and also fun to watch.

A great movie that is enjoyable to view again and again!

My wife and I like Hallmark movies, for good clean entertainment that doesn't require lots of "figuring things out." We have been working our way through the series of "Wedding Veil" movies and watched this one at home on DVD from our public library.

In the previous ones each of the three old friends, one after another, get in possession of the old Italian wedding veil and each finds her own true love. In the immediately prior one she meets her love in Italy and they decide to send him to Chicago to open a shop there.

But her job as an Art History professor is going well and she is in line to become department head when her boss retires soon. The conflict arises because she is about to achieve her career-long goal at the same time it seems her husband may need to go back to Italy to run the family business. So the main theme is the two of them deciding what "family" really means and work things out.

But the other story here, the next one to be recipient of the magic of the wedding veil, is Kacey Rohl as art student assistant, Lily. I cannot say too many good things about her and the role she created for this movie. She is such a versatile actress and she brought more life to this story than we find in most of the others. Her character was a real treat.

Overall this is a fine, entertaining movie with good things to say about relationships.