Perfect Wedding

Last night I finally watched Single All The Way. Loved it. After, I was debating whether to watch something else. I went to Amazon Prime and was browsing through my Watch List and came across Perfect Wedding. I thought to myself, oh, it’s about a fake couple and it takes place during the Christmas holiday, perfect! Because Single All The Way is about two best friends/roommates who plan to pretend to be boyfriends when one returns home for Christmas.

In this film’s defense, maybe because Single All The Way was a bit too similar to watch back to back, I didn’t pay as much attention as I would have had I watched it on its own. That being said, I enjoyed it. I expect Christmas films to be cheesy and I expect romcoms to be cheesy.

For this one, a guy named Roy is coming to celebrate his friend Alana’s wedding. The only thing is, her brother, Paul, is his ex and he hasn’t seen him since they had a nasty breakup. So, he does the only thing he can do, bring his friend, Gavin, who pretends to be his boyfriend.

While Alana is dealing with the stress of her mom (Kristine Sutherland aka Joyce Summers, aka Buffy Summers’ mom!) putting on a big wedding she doesn’t want, Paul and Gavin are getting closer and closer. Like with Single All The Way, the film isn’t subtle about who you should root for. Almost immediately after meeting Paul and Gavin bond over a game of charades. Both are apparently terrible at it, but can correctly answer for each other.

Here is where I’m going to be a hypocrite (if you haven’t read my post about Single All The Way, if you do, this will make more sense.) I didn’t like Paul and Gavin ending up together in the end. Maybe it’s because I thought Roy was going to be the main character (I didn’t even know his name until I looked it up to write this), so I was a bit thrown having this focus on Paul and Gavin. (In the film’s defense, the very first person you see is Paul.)

It’s not that I don’t think people who do bad things are irredeemable (hello, my favorite fictional character is Faith from Buffy the Vampire Slayer). I just didn’t connect with him as a character, so I didn’t care what he was going through. Let me be clear. I’m not saying it’s a bad film, nor am I saying I didn’t enjoy it, I just didn’t connect with the main character, whom I presume to be Paul. For clarity, Paul and Roy broke up because Paul was an alcoholic and going through a destructive downward spiral. He cheated on Roy and Roy caught him and that was the last time they saw each other.

Maybe it was because I just watched Single All The Way, but it would have been interesting to me to see Paul and Roy get together as they faked this relationship… but, I realize that would be a completely different story.

All that aside, there’s this moment I really liked between Paul and Gavin. So, at one point, Alana is telling Gavin how she met her soon-to-be husband, Kirk. It was an embarrassing situation, she had her skirt tucked into her underwear, and he let her know. I think he finds he some time later and they discuss it and he tells her he is going to marry her someday. During the climax of the film, Gavin has taken off because he and Paul kissed the night before, and Paul goes to find him once he realizes he did nothing wrong because Gavin and Roy aren’t together. He finds him and asks him to stay longer and once they get to know each other better, he’s going to marry him. (So cheesy, I know, but I love cheesy.) I love a good setup and payoff.

They kiss, and the next thing you know, they are kissing at the altar on their wedding day… who knows how much later that was, but sir, you told this man you are going to marry him someday after knowing him a couple days… at best.

Nonetheless, it’s a very cute film. I’ll probably wait a bit and then watch it again to see if my feelings have changed about it, as I’m well aware Single All The Way may have clouded my judgment about it.