Sydney Sweeney (ur.White Lotus, euphoria) and Glen Powell (Best pistol: Independent thinker) are the light-hearted co-stars in this frothy, old-fashioned romantic comedy, a loose adaptation of Shakespeare. Much ado about nothing.
Director: Will Gluck (Just A), the film revolves around law student Bea (Sweeney) and financier brother Ben (Powell), who meet at a cafe, spend the day and night together, and then get into an argument over a simple misunderstanding when she overhears his best friend Pete (GaTa) opposes her because he believes that she has lost him.
In the first of several inventions, it turns out that Bea’s sister Holly (Hadley Robinson) is marrying Pete’s sister Claudia (Alexandra Shipp) and the parents (Dermot Mulroney and Rachel Griffiths) are flying to Sydney for the wedding. Bea and Ben are forced to spend time together in each other’s presence with daggers drawn.
To prevent their constant sniping from ruining the wedding, their friends and family conspire to make Bea and Ben fall in love again, but complications arise when both of their exes (Charlie Fraser and Darren Barnet) show up at the wedding.
Both Powell and Sidney have movie star charisma and their chemistry is hot. If anything, it backfires because you don’t believe for a second that they hate each other or that they can’t solve their original problem with a few well-crafted excuses.
When Bea and Ben agree to fake a relationship just to get rid of everyone, you can almost hear the audience’s collective glances. Likewise, the appearance of exes never generates the absurd energy that could set it all in motion.
There’s a certain charm to it all, though, and a few jokes provide some laughs, especially a bit about the business of an unfortunate found spider and a sequence involving a “horrifying” recreation of a key scene from the film. TitanicThe result is the funniest line in the film.
Plus, Sydney’s sunny locales create a fairly light-hearted atmosphere, and there’s good comedic support from the likes of Dermot Mulroney and Bryan Brown (as Pete and Claudia’s father), although Rachel Griffiths’ sharp comedic talent is criminally underutilized. To the point where you wonder why they even chose her if they didn’t want to take full advantage of her abilities.
Everyone except you sends you out the door with a smile on your face thanks to a cleverly conceived and cleverly edited credits sequence. Ultimately, it comes down to the charisma, chemistry and comedic timing of the lead actors, even if the painstakingly crafted script often falls flat.
Source: I News
I am Mario Pickle and I work in the news website industry as an author. I have been with 24 News Reporters for over 3 years, where I specialize in entertainment-related topics such as books, films, and other media. My background is in film studies and journalism, giving me the knowledge to write engaging pieces that appeal to a wide variety of readers.