★ 7 / 10
Pretty good rom-com with Indian twist
herrcarter-92161
This was a fairly decent rom-com and, basically Hallmark's love letter to the Indian-American community. Was it predictable? Of course. We've seen a few of…
This was a fairly decent rom-com and, basically Hallmark's love letter to the Indian-American community. Was it predictable? Of course. We've seen a few of these stories where a matchmaker attempts to set a person up with multiple people, only to have the person wind up with the matchmaker themselves (or the matchmaker's son, in this case). But it was still fairly fun to watch. The multiple peeks into the fascinating Indian culture were icing on the cake for this story.
Eva Bourne gave a good performance as our dating app employee and matchmaking guinea pig Vivi. She was cute, fun and very relatable. Rushi Kota's performance as Boom, the matchmaker's son, was also good. He's a good looking guy, but he also came across as down-to-earth and likable. Did they have chemistry? Yeah, somewhat. It could've been better, but honestly, Hallmark is rarely able to get chemistry just right in its rom-coms. I don't know if it's the actors or the script, but let's just give them an A (or a B+) for effort here. I also really liked some of the supporting actors, particularly Rehha Sharma as the matchmaker mom. She was great.
The screenplay was decent, but it had a few rough spots. Sometimes the dialog was good, but sometimes it was a little unnatural. I didn't buy Vivi's attitude toward the end, where she was ready to give up on love because it didn't work out with Tristan, the only man left standing of the 3 guys she had been matched with. There just wasn't enough development of any kind of a relationship between Vivi and Tristan to make me even believe that she liked him, let alone that she would be devastated about things not working out with him. I also didn't like that they had Vivi's parents get divorced at the end. Here they were, getting along better. Marriage therapy was working. And then they decide to get a divorce? Why? It seemed so unnecessary to the plot.
One other elephant in the room that this movie totally glossed over was the fact that Indian matchmakers are specifically trying to match Indians with other Indians, so they can preserve their culture and religion. It's beyond unbelievable that Boom's mom would be cool with him marrying Vivi, a non-Indian. For a movie that seemed to be pretty clued into the Indian culture, this was one plot point that seemed really inauthentic. Or did she convert to Hinduism? If so, maybe they should have mentioned that. Or they could have had her be Indian as well -- perhaps really Americanized and detached from the traditions of her culture, but still Indian.
Otherwise, this movie was a pleasant enough diversion and a fun immersion in the Indian culture. It could've been better, but it's still worthy of a watch.
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★ 7 / 10
Good matchup
MickyG333
7.4 stars. I was pleasantly surprised by the presentation of this film, the actors are all ready to shine, the male lead is a come-from-behind guy who really…
7.4 stars.
I was pleasantly surprised by the presentation of this film, the actors are all ready to shine, the male lead is a come-from-behind guy who really starts to step us as time goes on. I like his laid back approach. The lead female is very endearing. There are some glaring inconsistencies, but that's fine. One of them is the fact that Indian friends and other people are sprinkled throughout the story and that's not convincing to me. There is no Indian culture in her life at all save the main female matchmaker and her son who runs the business. That makes for an unconvincing story somewhat, nevertheless it's enjoyable.
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★ 7 / 10
A 5.5 that became a 7
weniwuna
I really do wish that they had half scores here, such as 7 1/2 or 8 1/2. As I wrote in the title, this movie started out very middle of the road. I felt the…
I really do wish that they had half scores here, such as 7 1/2 or 8 1/2. As I wrote in the title, this movie started out very middle of the road. I felt the lead actress came across as though she just got the script and was "acting" rather than being true to the character. Slowly, but surely, as the movie went on, I found myself becoming involved and caring about the characters. As in most romcoms, you know who is going to end up with whom, but it was not until the last half of the movie that you could see the reasons. The script became more specific, as well as the acting becoming more believable. I really liked the fact that her parent's marriage, without being a spoiler here, ended up the way it did. Things like this portion of the movie, and the details in delving deeper into characters, made it worth watching until the end.
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80%
AUDIENCE
6.3/10
620
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