Another day and another barely passable ROE TV movie. This time it was mostly ruined by writing but let me start with technical issues as this is after all ROE TV movie and they are notorious that they almost always have some technical issues which ruin immersion. I was shocked that this movie doesn't have any audio issues at all! It has only really one bad cut. The only issue is the fake NYC filming location so they had to excessively use NYC stock footage to fool viewer that movie wasn't obviously filmed in Hamilton, Canada. They even reused the same reddish brick building for indoor shoting like in so many other movies.
Casting per se was ok, but there are some serious issues and those are not their fault but the production one. Celeste Desjardins was ok, I liked her fashion styling, way better than most female leads in so many other ROE TV movies, but she was ruined by horrendous makeup in the most of the movie. She is young and naturally beatiful and doesn't need war paint on her face! Just look how she looked drastically better in the scenes when she volunteered as she was natural. Andrew Bushell is the biggest victim of poor writing, and I really hope that one day he'll be in the movie paired with a proper lead black actress.
Supporting cast is another elephant in the room. It seems that Glen Michael Grant has contract with ROE to always play rich black guy - first he was CEO and owner of venture capital company, than sport/baseball agency, and now shipping company. This is the second time in the row he is going to retire, too but he seeks to give his CEO position to a guy who has to be in a succesful relationship so it can be taken serious because of obvious PR issues. Then I checked writer, and, oh look, it's Courtney Cilman who wrote both "Luckless in Love" and this one and they even conveniently share titles. Also, there are not one, but two fake French women in the movie but I'll give to Alison Brooks that at least she knows how to speak French even it's Quebec one.
This movie mainly failed because of writing. Fake relationship trope is one of my favourite, and oh look, Courtney Cilman also wrote two trainwrecks about it: "A Love to Remember" and "Lease on Love". This is her 3rd movie about it, but fourth I watched. Act I is a big joke, I can't even call it a comedy. Act II is mostly meh, but around the half of movie you can finally feel some energy, and I was shocked that movie improved a lot of later but it can't erase previous bad.
This is the first time I watched any ROE TV movie which delves into politics on federal level, and maybe it's really the first one. I'm going to defend Cilman on this one because she pulled impossible - M. Nolden played Renee, white mid aged spinster crooked liberal UMC woman who is running for Senate in DC, not the state one in Albany, NY. Yes, it is never stated she is D, but she's your typical D politician and voter. I mean, running as I for Congress is impossible task, and she is all about public schools which is typical D issue. And there is another huge thing - strong anti-cancel message and it was especially stressed by the French woman.
This movie is more like 3,5-4* stars, but as I mentioned because writing and directing actually improved by the end, side story politics was done exceptionally well and there are no technical issues which plague so many ROE TV movies, so I gave it 5* but it's barely.
And as every other ROE TV movie, don't watch trailer if you plan to watch the movie as it shows everything!
