Un fidanzato in regalo

A vacation to romance--a dessert of delight. Ali showed her acting chops. Who could not love Ali Cobrin? Choosing between her catering future and relational desert was played well by Cobrin.

The direction by Doyle showed a delicate skill portraying relational awkwardness and angst. Slow at first, the screenplay evolved into a delightfully predictable conclusion. Sea horses indeed.

Thanks for this romantic interlude. Sometimes love is this rich, delectably rich.

The fake boyfriend is a top very familiar theme. In this case working more than decent for actors chemistry, some tender moments, for humor and reasonable cliches. Short- a dark hair Prince Charming, a young lady under pressure of family and a sort of mutual help with predictable end. So, just nice.

Apart from a couple of errors in dialogue regarding the time frame and the pro's soufflé naivety, this movie is pretty realistic (eg the obsession with age 35 cut off when it comes to finding a partner). There's about the right amount of awkwardness in the 'fake' couple and the other relationships - the family are loving and a bit annoying, even the leading lady pressures her 'little brother'. It is all-age friendly, especially with three generations included, and highlights some of the cross-generational problems that wouldn't exist if people just stopped and thought about how we make life difficult for others through thoughtless comments etc. Whilst the pretend partner plot is not original, this movie still has merit, especially the acting of Jesse Hutch (who is almost unrecognisable with his covid lockdown-locks).

The fake boyfriend (fiance, sometimes even husband) is an extremely common premise in movies and romance novels. Everyone has a good idea that there is going to be a falling out and then how it's going to end.

I enjoyed the couple. I'm not familiar with Ali Cobrin but I really enjoyed her character. I've seen plenty of Jesse Hutch. These two fit well together. They seemed natural in the role they were playing.

Some minor negative points: the sets were obviously low budget. Once when Callie and Will are dancing, she is only slightly moving and at times it doesn't look like he is moving at all. He might have swayed a whole 2 inches back and forth.

Bad dialog. Bad story. Bad acting except for Charles Cottier who plays the brother Will. He reminds very much of a young David Arquette.

It's just a terrible and painful movie.