Falling Together

Hallmark's recent foray into what I always think of as After School Specials for adults. In addition to rom coms taking place in fictitious countries still ruled by royals or predicated on amnesia, widowhood, or broken down modes of transportation, Hallmark has a steady sideline in message-driven movies. In this case, the unlikely storyline is Alzheimer's awareness awkwardly shoehorned into a plot about a woman obsessed with developing community in a condo building. The two "leads" are the building superintendent who has been SCARRED by CARING and thus is aggressively isolated and an overly giving self denying college admissions officer who doesn't work ever because she has moved to town 6 weeks early SOLELY to get to KNOW THE NEIGHBORS - in Pittsburgh - cue the Mr. Rogers jokes. She becomes overly involved in an Alzheimers awareness walk while also endlessly insisting on new and fun ways to create COMMUNITY in her condo building. While the message is nice, the execution is horrible. The movie makes little to no sense. Perhaps a movie about a person WITH Alzheimers might have been a better idea? Or about caregiver? IDK anything but this unholy marriage of weird storylines.

Ashley Williams was lovely in this fall-centric Hallmark romance and Paul Campbell was an excellent foil or calm to her exuberant enthusiasm, but the real star was Rryla McIntosh who played the beautiful and quirky Drea.

Natalie moves from Florida to the city of brotherly love (aka Philadelphia) and finds her condominium complex is filled with anything but. She decides to try to bring her neighbors together and she eventually ropes the handsome young super Mark into helping reluctantly. Natalie befriends the local diner owner and pie maker, Rryla and volunteers for a local walk for Alzheimer's befriending Lynda Payne in the process. The Alzheimer's cause is near and dear to Lynda's heart and I think the addition of this cause was the heart of this romance which seems to be built around finding a balance between "me time" and bringing community together.

Overall, I think the message was good and I liked the fall backdrop. The two main characters supported each other well. I always find it funny to hear so many Canadian accents in the heart of America, but maybe others don't hear it?

Kind of a middle of the road Hallmark romance, but I think their core fans will enjoy it.

Paul Campbell is a reliable Hallmark star (and one who attracts a lot of irrational hate for his stance on social issues that I am sure you can figure out - I'm sure there'll be the usual hate for this one as a result) and Ashley Williams is pretty good, too.

I just didn't completely feel their chemistry, and these Hallmark movies are nothing if the leads don't have a certain amount of chemistry.

That said, the Alzheimer's storyline is sensitively handled. It's such a terribly debilitating disease that you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy. I was pleasantly surprised to see it a part of the plot, but it wasn't enough to save the movie.

Also: not enough outdoor fall scenes for mine. The best Hallmark fall movies have lots of scenes outside.

To be honest I got attacked by happiness watching this movie. I already knew the story would be simple, but it surprised me with some interesting plots. Also this movie showcased a good cause (please watch to know)! I feel like it's THE perfect family-romance-slice of life movie. You don't have to think too much tho, let the story serves you they way it does. It was very lovely imo, I didn't find it cringey I even thought it's very relatable. I enjoyed this movie so much, thinking of rewatching again sometime after I crossed my queuing hallmark movie lists off. Definitely recommended, especially if you like light storied movies.

We were looking forward to seeing this movie supposedly set in Pittsburgh. I have lived here all my life and am sorry for the newly arrived main character's experience with everyone she met. The only character that came close to a genuine Pittsburgher was the wonderful restaurant waitress who was a joy every time she was in a scene ""because she was genuine". We do have many charity walks, runs and bicycle events. This event came off reasonably well but it looks like they had a low budget for extras for both the charity walk and condo association.

When we come across people with the nasty attitudes of those condo dwellers we know they must be from out of town. The movie had some nice skyline views of the real Pittsburgh and they used names of actually places and neighborhoods in town but it was obvious that it was shot somewhere else.... not enough hills and how can you shoot in Pittsburgh and not use the many historic neighborhoods?. The brick condo building was somewhat believable but we were trying to place what possible suburb they were using for the rest. It turns out mostly filmed in British Columbia.

We wanted to like this film but the sugary sweetness and unreasonable expectations of the main character were too much.