Amor, Felicidade ou Casamento

Mandy Moore is a sickly sweet daughter of a divorcing couple that just got married herself. She's also a counselor. She almost loses her own hubby trying to fix her parents. B- Hallmark Grade.

If this is the best that Dermot Mulroney can do as a director, then I can safely say that I'll pass on any future projects to which he is attached. This is another "Pottery Barn/cashmere throw" style rom com a la Nancy Meyers (with his and hers convertibles!), but her scripts are superior. This one ranks with the worst offerings on Lifetime TV-- superficial, dull and directed in a lumbering style. The lead is miscast: Mandy Moore is unbelievable as a marital counselor with a Ph.D and a thriving private practice. She has no intellectual weight, no emotional maturity and delivers her lines like a high school girl. It gets old fast. I'm not a Jew but I was offended by the way Brolin's character tries to "explore" his spirituality by taking on all the trappings of that faith and nothing else. If this "subplot" was supposed to be funny, it really wasn't. (Compare the scene in "Annie Hall" when Woody Allen decides to become a Catholic and unpacks white bread and mayo from a grocery bag.) In order to get to the end (which I had to do because of my work), I entertained myself by ticking off how many times Jane Seymour dropped her American accent in the middle of sentences (47). This is a waste of 90 mins and you're better off watching something else.

This film has some of the most outrageous characters. I understand trying to be funny, but some of these people, like the fitness lady, the shrink, the Polish girlfriend and even the mom were just too ridiculous. There was talk about sex in a very awkward (makes you cringe kind of ) way. Mandy's character was too shallow and blind.

I could go on. There really wasn't even one scene where I smiled or connected with, and that's difficult, considering that I LOVE romance and chick flicks.

Do yourself a favor and skip this one, unless you really enjoy irrational, crazy, thinking they are so funny, characters.

This movie is hard to rate as there are good components within a movies structure however ultimately a film's aim called "Love, Wedding, Marriage" should be to help people in society to learn to do the right things in their relationships, however this movie rewards all the terrible decisions that would fail in real life.

For the reason above I would seriously NOT recommend this movie to others.

Now the story has cohesion & the script is acted out well but the main actress Mandy Moore's character Ava is not only the world's worst marriage counsellor but quite simply the character Ava makes terrible decisions & is rewarded for making them ( in real life these decisions would have made everything worse ). This is not a romantic comedy you could learn from, in fact it would encourage people to be totally irresponsible in the hope things would just work out still. What kind of message is this to give out but being totally irresponsible writing.

Now I usually love Mandy Moore's characters in other movies & TV shows as she usually plays someone kind, considerate, empathetic but with some reality in her characters that will have believable flaws but ultimately she has a good heart. Now in this movie her character is a complete childish idiot who apparently has a degree in psychology from a very prodigious college ( don't mention the college as in real life they would be ashamed of this character Ava ) so to have her mess up so bad OK we could put up with but then to reward some terrible behaviour in the movie is disgraceful & disgusting, as the movie should have shown how she messed everything up but then when she finally allowed things to be done by an independent therapist over some time an amicable agreement within the family could have been found from a foundation of honesty all real relationships need.

At the end of the movie are any of the characters really better off you have to ask & the answer has to be a resounding NO they are worse off & all their problems are still there as all their underlying issues have not really been addressed at all.

So the acting was OK ( as actors did as they were told ) so they lose a star ( -1 ) because Kellan Lutz's acting is not really up to par especially ( though ironically his character in the movie is actually overall a decent human being ), then the storyline not being realistic loses just another star ( -1 ) making this in terms of production value & direction an 8 out of 10 movie, however we then have to be responsible in our rating I believe & state the "message" in the movie of keep doing awful terrible things & everything will work out at the end of the movie is a really dreadful message as I would not my daughter thinking this was in any way educational like you normally get from an actual "good message" rom com.

So this takes the movie from a must see "8 star" to a must avoid "4 star" as anything 5 or below simply should not be worth the effort to watch it at all.

If they had made a sequel to this movie & actually laid out this movies story first to any real life marriage psychologist I think they would have had to point out how every couple in this movie would most likely end up heart broken & alone.

Unless of course they actually recognised the dreadful mistakes they had made & actually started all acting like decent human beings & started being really honest with themselves & their partners plus family. As only then could this movie have any kind of redemption as the ending of this first movie really is not a good plot point if you actually want to be helping real people find real life marriage help.

When you are telling a story like this you have to ask yourself what are the morals to the tale, as the answer is actually it is mostly immoral then why put that out there ( all that negativity ) as you could literally encourage someone to ruin their life or others lives because they are misguided enough to believe in your fantasy.

This movie just isn't very funny, endearing or involving as a dramedy. It runs out of steam early. Just aren't many funny situations. And those that could have been funny were done better before (eg the speed dating scene). There could have been better situations with the marriage counseling theme but the one with Alison Hannigan is okay.

Wanted to watch this mainly for the likable attractive cast. Unfortunately the material they are given to work with isn't good. Mandy Moore isn't the best actress but her lines aren't really that great so can't blame her. Kellan Lutz's character isn't convincing. He doesn't look like he is ready to settle down at all more like some big frat boy. Jessica Szhor's character is more likable than in Gossip Girl. James Brolin is a bit miscast. It's nice to see Jane Seymour acting again - haven't seen her since "Wedding Crashers".

Overall watch it once if you are fan of the cast but bear in mind it just isn't that good.