"Dream Wedding" 2023 GFAM
No movie is as bad as many of the reviews here made this out to be, It was not a truly great movie, but it certainly did not deserve the cornucopia of insulting adjectives thrown at the writers, directors, cast, and final product as was done here.
What we have here is a different type of story, and perhaps that threw off those who were expecting the typical rom-com with tried and true tropes. "Dream Wedding" wasn't one of those movies. Instead it was an attempt to put Rebecca Dalton and Jesse Hutch together despite many obstacles placed there by other people and circumstances. The movie was about two sisters who enter and win a wedding contest--wedding related prizes, a fancy honeymoon, etc. But one must be engaged to enter, of course. Reviewers criticized Dalton's character, Kate, for "lying" about her engagement status--she was not. But Kate was obviously browbeaten by her sister Megan, played by Crista Taylor Brown, who was engaged, and who also clearly had a duplicitous streak, and who knew she could manipulate her sister to give her the prizes. So manipulate she did. So who was the bad guy?
Jesse Hutch, playing a photographer, gets involved in the "scam." At first we're not sure if he's just being helpful to the sisters by offering to take wedding photos, or is interested in Dalton, but one suspects the latter. As Megan insisted that Kate get a fake fiance--Hutch helps arrange it. Both Dalton and Hutch's characters are low key, and so much happens around them that they are not really controlling things in this story. There is a tendency for the viewer, at least there was for me, to feel sorry for them. Dalton's sister Megan, Dalton's fake fiance played by Geoff Shangh (a real goofball I thought), and a random woman (not sure which actress played her) from the wedding contest the sisters won (actually Kate won) who was trying to beat the prizes out of the sisters. Even the parents of the sisters, who were not in on Megan's scam, put enormous pressure on Kate. And the fact that Megan was in fact getting married soon and wanted all the prizes which, again, were actually won by Kate...well, Kate just could not say no to her sister.
I won't get into the end game, here. I enjoyed it. I thought Dalton and Hutch were well cast to end up together. There wasn't a long slow build-up as in many rom-coms--to which I attribute all the pressure Dalton was under--but as in all romance films, all's well that ends well.
No movie is as bad as many of the reviews here made this out to be, It was not a truly great movie, but it certainly did not deserve the cornucopia of insulting adjectives thrown at the writers, directors, cast, and final product as was done here.
What we have here is a different type of story, and perhaps that threw off those who were expecting the typical rom-com with tried and true tropes. "Dream Wedding" wasn't one of those movies. Instead it was an attempt to put Rebecca Dalton and Jesse Hutch together despite many obstacles placed there by other people and circumstances. The movie was about two sisters who enter and win a wedding contest--wedding related prizes, a fancy honeymoon, etc. But one must be engaged to enter, of course. Reviewers criticized Dalton's character, Kate, for "lying" about her engagement status--she was not. But Kate was obviously browbeaten by her sister Megan, played by Crista Taylor Brown, who was engaged, and who also clearly had a duplicitous streak, and who knew she could manipulate her sister to give her the prizes. So manipulate she did. So who was the bad guy?
Jesse Hutch, playing a photographer, gets involved in the "scam." At first we're not sure if he's just being helpful to the sisters by offering to take wedding photos, or is interested in Dalton, but one suspects the latter. As Megan insisted that Kate get a fake fiance--Hutch helps arrange it. Both Dalton and Hutch's characters are low key, and so much happens around them that they are not really controlling things in this story. There is a tendency for the viewer, at least there was for me, to feel sorry for them. Dalton's sister Megan, Dalton's fake fiance played by Geoff Shangh (a real goofball I thought), and a random woman (not sure which actress played her) from the wedding contest the sisters won (actually Kate won) who was trying to beat the prizes out of the sisters. Even the parents of the sisters, who were not in on Megan's scam, put enormous pressure on Kate. And the fact that Megan was in fact getting married soon and wanted all the prizes which, again, were actually won by Kate...well, Kate just could not say no to her sister.
I won't get into the end game, here. I enjoyed it. I thought Dalton and Hutch were well cast to end up together. There wasn't a long slow build-up as in many rom-coms--to which I attribute all the pressure Dalton was under--but as in all romance films, all's well that ends well.