Film Review: You, Me, & Tuscany
0
0
Read Time:3 Minute, 36 Second
You, Me, & Tuscany, the newest Will Packer produced romcom, arrived in theaters this weekend with a seemingly winning formula. We’ve got two good-looking and well known actors, a visually sumptuous location, and a premise that’s foolish enough for the genre. Mileage may certainly vary on your opinion of this film, but for people aiming for an inoffensive, lighthearted picture, they’ll certainly find one here.
The movie tells the story of Anna, a culinary school dropout turned house sitter, finding herself at a bit of a crossroads. Having just gotten fired from her house sitting job, she drowns her sorrows in a cheeseburger and one drink, that she can only afford due to maxing out a credit card and getting her friend’s employee discount. It’s during this low moment that she meets a charming Italian man, whom she hits it off with. When their sexy times are thwarted and he has to leave early in the morning, Anna decides that their conversation the night before is the sign she needed to go to Italy. Unfortunately for her, the town she’s in is hosting a major festival and all the hotels are booked. She can’t even get a sandwhich at a shop without a dashing, yet rude man (Rege Jean-Page). But wouldn’t you know it, her problems are solved when she remembers that Matteo told her about his house in the same city. What’s a little light breaking and entering and putting on an engagement ring between friends? But that’s not all! When she’s discovered by his family, she lies and says she’s Matteo’s fiancé, kicking off a ton of shenanigans and the blossoming of a beautiful relationship.
As a lover of romance and rom coms, I actually think that we should have more preposterous scenarios in our movies. The ridiculousness of our main character deciding to fly to Italy with no plan and then formulating a plan that involved breaking and entering, lying to an entire family about who she is, while simultaneously falling in love with the cousin-brother of the man she’s pretending to be the fiancé of – truly a hilarious premise. Completely, totally and utterly ridiculous, but I admit I was quite charmed by it. Even just typing the above paragraph made me chuckle and there are moments in this movie that genuinely made me laugh out loud (the sister’s constant reference to her affair never hesitated to get a laugh out of me) and Rege and Halle do have some lovely chemistry. The premise fits Halle Bailey’s talents like a glove, allowing her to bring forth the many facets of Anna. The movie is at its best when it stops having her talk about the various issues, but actively pushing her against them.
However, even with some winning elements, I found the totality of this film to be trifle. Everything about the movie feels too clean and too nice, the movie rarely challenging itself to move beyond surface level entertainment. This mostly occurs because You, Me, & Tuscany’s characters do a lot of talking about their problems and their issues. A lot. Michael especially. Rege is charming as all get out and does sell that once Michael gets past the initial foolishness that he falls for Anna, but we hear so much about him being a workaholic , that he never thinks of himself, that he feels alienated from the family…and yet saying this movie barely scratches the surface of any of that would be insulting to the phrase. There’s just not enough there there in this movie to justify the climax of this movie because the movie treats the serious subject matter (lying to an entire family and town) as trifle – a choice that may have made sense if the movie took place over a longer stretch of time. It’s fun to have a holiday sojourn to Italy but the movie feels so uninterested in these characters’ lives beyond what plot machinations we need to hit to propel the movie forward.
For a movie about a chef, it’s like they only wanted to feed us candy, when the real meet of the meal is just outside the periphery of You, Me, & Tuscany.
Happy
0 %
Sad
0 %
Excited
0 %
Sleepy
0 %
Angry
0 %
Surprise
0 %