Cloudy with a Chance of Love (2015) Reviews

• slightly outside the Hallmark envelope... Rady and Leclerc add their own stamp

  laurelmcf2015-02-24

  I love Hallmark films for their predictable formula: single woman-focused screenplay in which too-successful, insufficiently caring "perfect" but workaholic guy must be shed for an authentic man of feeling. What I especially love are the Hallmark tropes: new guy must be thrown into an early, intense encounter with single girl's parent/s; numerous late model cars must be driven pointlessly around town with elaborate driveway exit scenes; characters' occupations are bipolar business/law vs wedding planning, writing, art. As predictable as this makes a Hallmark, variations on this theme become deeply satisfying, as we watch these elemental themes -- the search for the authentic life, the rejection of empty success, the social pressure for the conventional path, play out again and again. And thus each Hallmark character takes on allegorical significance in this larger search for authenticity. Hallmark movies remind me of a comment Sana Haque made about the great French writer Roland Barthes' Mythologies: "Barthes deciphers how wrestlers take on tragic or comic "stock" personas for the benefit of their fans and how their exaggerated gestures, drama, and Good vs. Evil conflicts perform a cathartic function for the audience, a venue through which frustrated emotion can find a release and the complexity of modern existence revert to black and white simplicity." So, in this allegorical frame, Cloudy with a Chance of Love shakes it up a (very) little bit. Here on the road to the authentic life, the sub-theme is change. Katie Leclerc's character, a PhD meteorology student at a mythical San Diego university has spent her life happily in one place, focused on one consuming interest (the heavens). On her heretofore uneventful road to a fellowship and professorship, she now encounters a TV news director, played by Michael Rady, who pulls her toward a huge change when he convinces her to sub as a meteorologist at his station. He even tries eventually to get her to leave San Diego in a two-fer deal to try network news in New York. Michael Rady has matured from his days of Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. In this movie he channels Ken Olin from his Thirtysomething days-- the sensitive and empathetic listener to a well-educated woman's earnestly related hopes and dreams and self-doubts. There's a soulfulness here to Rady's acting that was unexpected and welcome in a Hallmark.While his ambition to go back to network news in New York nearly sinks a budding romance with adorable Leclerc, he manages an unusual Hallmark workaholic accomplishment. He gets the girl despite all that, once he finds his own "authentic" path back to San Diego, and "saves" her by firing her and reconnecting her with her academic destiny. John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, and other towering works of allegory have tread these familiar paths many times before Hallmark screenplays, but how nice it is to turn on the Hallmark channel and watch these characters play out our hopes and fears. When the actors are as sympathetic, and winsome as Rady and Leclerc, and the chemistry believable, it is an evening well spent. It would be great to see both Leclerc and Rady enter the pantheon of Hallmark repeaters-- those actors we love to see in other Hallmark themes and variations.

• Generic, derivative, redundant, and San Diego

  Larry-R2015-02-09

  Hallmark seems content to take time tested formulas for plots and characters, where any weaknesses in any aspect have been chipped away, and the highest quality has been demanded of the production and creative people. An example of something that's annoyed me about previous movies like this one... I am used to the anchorman being a stupid chauvinist jerk who hits on the lead female character, but in this movie the anchorman is a nice, smart guy who's respectful and helpful to her. It seems to me like movies on Hallmark have gotten to a point where reductionist criticism seems pointless. The script was good, the acting was good, the sets were good, the costumes were good, the cinematography was good... but that's to be expected on Hallmark. But I think I can safely say in some senses this movie is generic, derivative, and redundant. I don't really care though, because I liked and enjoyed it more than similar movies that came before it, and I expect to watch it again. The dozens of mentions of San Diego did get on my nerves a little, even though I usually have no objection to subtle product placements.

• It gets a 7 Star because of what it sparked in my heart! Read my review please!!

  huggibear2017-03-23

  There was closure to a degree of satisfaction, but I never understood what career path Rady (the lead male actor) was embarked upon considering how it ended. I like that fact that Leclerc (the lead female actress) was a born leader and it showed some multi- taking dynamics that would not be successful without the vision (focused) on her destined choice and where her happiness was in all of those choices presented to her. Yes, the money offers looked appealing, but would she have been happy on a path she did not have in her vision/focus all along? Interesting how options and choices can alter our course as humans. Yes, most of us want the money and that is the ultimate goal if you can get both the happy , fulfilling choice right along with the money. But most of us tend to go the money route and forego the latter, when ideally we need both paths to work in our favor. Money is the biggest topic of many love relationships. So, does that say the money is important to us? Absolutely! Shame on whomever does not feel this way because money is the topic that splits a lot of love relationships up. So we need more focused happy, satisfied and fulfilling money paths early on is our youthfulness, so we can feel a lot more independent and not 'NEEDY' of each other. The movie was great because it helped me shed light on options/choices and how best to satisfy my future with prosperity/abundance of all things I love/desire, including money and maybe a love partnership if that is ever in the cards. It's not a need, but a future desire. Thank you Hallmark for another movie that makes me think!

• Upbeat story, likable stars

  phd_travel2015-09-25

  There is an upbeat energy to this Hallmark rom com that carries it along. Doesn't get painful and dull like some others have. It's not a silly story either. I love Katie LeClerc in "Switched at Birth". She does so well at playing a deaf girl and speaking like one that it's surprising to see that she is actually isn't deaf. Her facial expressions are similar to Switched. She plays a meteorology graduate student facing a choice between becoming a TV weather anchor and pursuing academia. Good supporting cast. A slightly older Stacy Dash of Clueless and Gregory Harrison as TV makeup artist and anchor respectively. Michael Rady plays the TV station executive trying to woo her career wise and romantically. The choice is San Diego vs New York. Fulfillment vs financial success. The outcome is a bit predictable. The only thing I wonder is if they give up the Big Apple what are they going to live on? Her fellowship grant?