For Love & Honey

This sadly is a disappointing review with a disappointing rating. Andrew Walker is one of the finest....maybe the finest actor ....on the Hallmark roster. He easily could make a PSA deserve a rating of 7 just on his own acting abilities. Virtually in every movie he has starred in....at some point....he makes you feel something. Especially in a Hallmark movie, somewhere you should feel something...be touched by something.......but not this time....not this movie. Throughout the entire movie, there was more time spent on bee stories with almost nothing spent on the human relationships. In this movie, there was nothing to be felt by the viewers. They never got us to feel...be touched....even care about their story. This movie was more like some primer or a PSA on bees and their place in the ecology....completely devoid of all human emotions. Unfortunately, even Andrew Walker couldn't bring a good rating to this PSA. Hallmark wasted his talents...and the location of Malta.

American professor of archaeology meets a beekeeper on Malta. Who would've guessed archaeologists and beekeepers had so much in common. Except, he doesn't like honey and he's allergic to bees.

There is a treasure map (no, he's not Indiana Jones) and there is a treasure hunt...

I do wonder why Hallmark movies are now putting the first kiss at the one hour point instead of at the end of the movie, but that's probably my personal issue....

This young couple "plays" Indiana Jones and "Indiana Jane". Honeybees are the center of this movie and are parts of all of the clues, so pay attention.

It's Hallmark, so it's the predictable formula; you know they'll be a happy ending.

This movie was so difficult to watch. It felt like it could have been a good story/concept but it was so poorly executed. Here's everything that went wrong:

• NO chemistry whatsoever. I think it was supposed to be a grumpy/sunshine sort of trope, but just came across as him being a weak/beta male while she was very entitled and basically hated him the entire time for no reason. She seemed to enjoy pushing him around and making him mad. The grumpy/sunshine trope really only works when "grumpy" hates everyone but their love interest. This was the reverse, she was nice to everyone EXCEPT her love interest.

• SO MANY THINGS WRONG with the beekeeping part of the story. As a beekeeper myself I felt insulted that they did so little research. From things like their "wild" hive which was a foot long piece of honeycomb smashed on a wall, her removal of that comb where she just smashed it up even more and stuck it in a box, getting pissed at the MLI for swatting at a frickin drone bee, her going back to the removal site the next day to capture a SINGLE LEFTOVER DRONE to take back to the beehive, and finally talking about how bees "mate for life"????? No species of worker bee ever mates, only the queen. And when she does she takes like 25 partners in one day and never again in her life. So many things wrong it was literally making me cringe.

• Horrible dialogue. I won't even rant about this one. I'll just leave it with a quote "what kind of loyal drone would leave his queen in a time of need" ~ MIL weak attempt at flirting (also the sole purpose of a drone is to leave his queen to mate with another and consequently die)

What I liked: 1. Hallmark and Malta must have worked out some financial deal, given the number of films set here. And that's fine by me because it is a great location.

2. Andrew Walker does his best to make an otherwise dud of a script watchable. He seems to be their current go to for bad scripts in exotic locations. And he does a nice job here as an archeologist.

What I didn't like: 1. Boring script with a lot of lazy unforced errors. Which is how I'd sum up many recent Hallmark releases. An example of this laziness is the ridiculous "ancient artwork" they discover. They could have put in minimal effort to make it look somewhat believable. But that's Hallmark for you.

2. The acting was pretty rough other than Andrew. The female lead could be good in other roles, but struggled to find chemistry with Andrew. Also, her character (either by design or in her approach to the role) was hard to like.

An American Archeology professor meets a Maltan beekeeper...and they run smack into each other, for a slightly contentious first meeting. This is followed by a second meeting when she discovers he is afraid of bees and he discovers she doesn't revere ancient texts the way he does...but once they discover an ancient fresco, the two work together to solve it's mysteries. The fresco acts as a sort of map that leads them around Malta to some ancient ruins and with gold in the title could it be that they are actually looking for treasure? Lots of interesting facts about honey and bees, which makes them the true star of this Hallmark romance.

I really liked having a more mature female lead and I always enjoy Andrew Walker...I think having him take his shirt off was unnecessary, but I did like that he was mechanically inclined and learned from his father such a practical skill as to be able to fix her vehicle (especially since he was afraid of bees). Overall, this was a cute coming together of two working professionals who had loved and lost in the past. They were well suited for each other and I think romantics will enjoy this film.

" I love finding a piece of history that gives you a window to the past."