Finding Love in Big Sky, Montana

I love Hallmark type movies and understand who they are for and how much the cost to make (Under 2 million dollars).

I can live with the short comings of a movie shot in 30 days but it all rests on the lead actors.

In this case,, it's rough.

Hedy Nasser is completely miss casted as a rancher even if we forgo the fact that she can't ride horses.

She doesn't have the charisma of someone in charge of a ranch.

She can't convey the financial difficulty that the ranch is facing.

She acts as she would be a guest afraid to speak-up on a "Dude ranch" for city people.

She can not "act" like she belongs on a ranch or near a horse.

She belongs in a "Princess story" or a "Christmas movie".

Jonathan Stoddard plays his character like if he completely depleted of testosterone.

He was way better in "Valentine's Town" and in "Baked with a Kiss".

It's rough.

On the technical side,, the cinematography is spectacular and the color grading is good (That's where the three stars I gave it come from.).

Where it all falls apart, is in the editing room.

The "ADR" (Automated Dialogue Replacement) is obvious, the music is aggressively omnipresent and and loud. The background soundtrack (children laughing) is on a 15 second loop repeating itself and it's grating to the ears.

So, here we are, left with a movie that broke the cardinal rule of the "under 2 million dollar budget" (cast) and it's rough.

Two overused premises. Paisley needs to save the ranch she inherited from beloved grandpa. Josh flees LA to lay low while scandal threatens his job. The two old flames reunite and what do they do? Well lets just say it's the same thing they do in similar circumstances in hundreds of these movies. Beyond that, there isn't much story and certainly no highs or lows. As for a predictable conflict, when the phone rang just before the last commercial I said to myself, No. Please don't use that plot device Again.

The acting is fair. There's little chemistry. The dialogue is just OK. I kind of liked Hedy Nasser for her cute sweetness, but that also sapped some of the intended strong woman vibe.

It's supposed to be a bad thing to use an "info dump" especially in a movie. My thoughts were - good, let's get all that over and settled. But then the story dragged anyway. And the voice is that opening narration was slightly grating.

There is some nice scenery but there is only so much appeal to looking at snowcapped mountains on the horizon with a bright blue sky.

It isn't really that this movie has anything great wrong with it. The problem is that it is just totally bland with the same story lines as so many other movies.

The first two minutes of this movie already took me off guard. Probably the most atrocious voice-over work I have ever heard in professionally made films. Hedy Nasser lacks the basic ability to emote in her narration. It is so bad that I was genuinely amused for a moment.

Fortunately the movie picks up a bit afterwards (I mean how can it not but still). It is a sweet little story about rekindled love and finding roots. I also quite enjoyed Jonathan Stoddard's performance. Supporting characters are fun to watch and provide some much needed levity. For some scenes the dialogues are obviously re-recorded afterwards, which sounds too whispery and stands out like a sore thumb.

I really wanted to like it. But the production just screams amateurish. Awful sound quality and a weak female lead let this movie down.

I have to admit I wasn't expecting much from this movie. I'm not a huge fan of western movies and it looked boring. So it took me a few weeks after I recorded it to watch it. Then one day I needed to delete some movies, I decided to watch the first 5 minutes of it before deleting it.

I was surprised - pleasantly. I ended up watching it to the end! I thought the two lead actors gave decent performances. I liked the diverse cast. I thought the story was heartwarming.

But I think the ending was a little bit weak. There were a couple of loose ends that could have been addressed. Despite these unresolved subplots, I still thought this movie was good enough for at least a one-time viewing.

Hedy Nasser and Jonathan Stoddard Nathan Kehn and Raechel Wong Made this movie come alive they were so great as couples there were so much chemistry between Paisley and Josh in this movie you get your very handsome guys you're beautiful scenery the most majestic horses it's just an all-around wonderful family movie and it is also based on a book by the same name it was also filmed in Montana this is definitely a movie I would watch more than once I'm giving this movie, five stars it was definitely a very original movie don't think I've ever seen a movie out there like this one definitely not your run of the mill Hallmark movie was not boring it did keep your attention I did have one little problem with the fact that she is alone on a ranch with horses how long comes a guy and sure they were friends 15 years ago she lets him stay there and then she picks his brother up and she lets his brother stay there and would have been nice if we got to see that ranch open up to the kids but she was wanting to come but that's okay I don't know if there is a sequel to the book to make a movie.