I liked some things about this Hallmark romance. It was fairly original, at least by Hallmark standards. No girl returning to a small town. No reconnecting with an old boyfriend. No struggling business that needed saving. None of the tired Hallmark tropes. The movie simultaneously pays homage to the culture surrounding Jane Austen's books, while also poking a little lighthearted fun at it, which I enjoyed. I liked Will Kemp as Sam, our Mr. Darcy cosplayer. He was charming and engaging and did the often self-deprecating humor quite well.
That being said, I can't say I found our heroine Eloise that likeable. She was way too tightly wound, pretty rude and also rather scheming and mercenary when it came to vying for that coveted professorship at Princeton. To be fair, Mallory Jensen did a good job of portraying this character as written. And her unlikeable exterior personality was clearly supposed to be a front to hide her deep-seated, underlying insecurities. Somehow, though, those initial unlikeable qualities were way too exaggerated for me to really warm up to her later in the movie. Her sister Mia was even worse. She was over-the-top annoying, and Lillian Doucet-Roche just overacted her.
There were some good interactions between Sam and Eloise, but I wouldn't say the chemistry was sizzling. The two almost kisses were just awkward, not romantic. There was a little bit of good banter between the two of them, but not nearly enough. In short, the romance between the two of them wasn't as good as it could or should have been.
So, this Hallmark romance, which had a premise with so much promise, just ended up being okay, not outstanding. I mostly blame the screenwriters, who were most likely under the gun to produce yet another movie in the Hallmark assembly line and didn't have enough time to do it really well.
