Made for Each Other

This thinly disguised remake of the 2011 Hallmark film "Holly's Holiday" gives a Jewish AND gender twist to the Pygmalion story, and manages to mangle every aspect of it despite some deft humor. It has an edgier feel than most Hallmark offerings in places, but completely blows it with one of the stupidest, most unbelievable, badly staged endings in Hallmark history. When will Hallmark learn that the public airing of the romantic finale in front of a fawning audience is a real turn off? No doubt die hard fans of the channel will laud it to the skies, but more sane observers will wonder why they watched it at all.

This film is really charming! Rachel, the lead character, is very relatable. She brings her statue of "the perfect man" to life, like Pygmalion with Galatea. The two guys interested in her were extremely different, but both appealing in their way. Clay is a giant puppy. I love that his name is Clay! David has an edge in just the right way.

The story has the perfect message overall. I laughed all through the ending. An excellent romcom for Hallmark.

The side characters were well-rounded and specific. I enjoyed the fun Jewish details. This is a great movie to cuddle on the couch with and enjoy!

7.8 stars.

I really like the lead actress in "Made for Each Other" and I really hope to see more of her in the future. She needs to become a Hallmark regular for sure. In this story she plays a sculptor who is down on her confidence due to several rejections of her works to be accepted more widely in the art community. She has fashioned a beautiful man sculpture, and she wishes so fervently that he was real that he actually comes to life, and is the perfect man. She has had difficulties dating men, because she is very picky, artsy, cynical, and sarcastic...all traits that might send any suitor running for the door. She happens to fall for a comedian while she's fallen for her sculpted golem man. You have to watch it to understand, because while this might be confusing, it's what transpires in this intriguing film.

Chemistry is amazing, the acting is amazing, the variety of characters are all well rehearsed and work very well together. This is almost a must see. I love the comedy fun interactions between the leads and the golem is a funny genius dud. Again, you have to see it to understand. Lovely and original take on Pygmalion they say. I suppose it is circuitously so.

I absolutely love this movie. The main character really nailed it. His expressions were filled with so much joy in a goofy way. Really an entertaining watch. It was kind of strange for me, because the romance didn't end up working out for him. I took two stars off because the side characters had an uninteresting romance. I disagree with the notion that the perfect man didn't challenge the girl. Yes he did, it just wasn't the way she wanted to be challenged. He challenged her to be more giving, as giving as he is. She wasn't so interested in that though. That's OK, some of us don't have a big capacity to love and therefore are unwilling to try to become a better person for the other.

Teryl Rothery, what were you thinking? How did you get roped into this role? The mother of the lead can be very bad, in the sense of too controlling, but this performance is ridiculous. Rothery is so much better than this. And the thing is that there is no reason this part had to be played so badly.

Except for Rothery, the bride's husband, and David's nephew, the rest of the acting was mostly good. Aaron O'Connell's Clay could have been easy to overplay, but O'Connell walked a fine line between too naive and being normal. Obviously Clay can't be normal, but neither is he too ridiculous. A few times, he goes just a little bit silly and then recovers before it gets too far.

I thought Alexandra Turshen and Matt Cohen had good chemistry. This is another tough situation because their screen time together was cut into by the time with Rachel and Clay and for that matter David and Clay.

The story was not as predictable as I expected. The premise of a statue coming to life in order to be the perfect mate seems like it is going to go in an obvious direction, and in this case that part was unavoidable, but the way it was done was fresh. The subtext of needing challenges in life rather than everything going perfectly was nicely folded into the story without being too preachy. The climax was a little wild which fit the story perfectly.

The dialogue was very good. I don't laugh at much on TV, but I got a few good ones between the standup and the banter.

All the good stuff is in Acts II and III, so don't give up on it.