When Sparks Fly (2014)

Elevator Pitch: Amy Peterson is a reporter on a Chicago newspaper which is losing circulation. She has an unsatisfactory relationship with her current boyfriend in the city, and so is pleased to get a commission to report on the 4th July celebration in her home town of Lakeside, Washington. Her parents are the suppliers of the firework display for the town, her former boyfriend is marrying her best friend, and she is made wedding planner for the event. So what can go wrong? Well, quite a lot, as the fireworks are cancelled, and she finds she still has feelings for her former lover.

Content: There is no nudity, smoking, drinking or even any snogging to raise the temperature. There is a meeting in the newsroom, and then in Lakeside the girls get together, and the wedding begins to be planned. The parents have firework problems as their contract for the town’s event is cancelled and so Amy has to quickly develop a website. There are preliminary events as rehearsals of the wedding to take place, particularly the trying on of the bridesmaid’s dresses and so on. Amy and Hank get to sit about a lot on a bench into which they have carved their initials. 

A View: I admit that we only watched this because we wanted to see the Duchess of Sussex (Is she still Duchess of Sussex?), formerly Meghan Markle, at work.  It was a terrible film, almost continuously irritating, as the young women involved spoke to each other in some sort of elevated hysterical register. Even in the country Amy’s boyfriend always wore a suit and tie, apparently a Chicago joke. The high point for me might have been a moment in a Chicago nouvelle cuisine restaurant when the actor playing the waiter doing the flambé dish must have set light to his hair. In short this is not a watch, even for nothing, but not quite awful enough to be a Don’t See.

Additional Info: This was a Hallmark Channel film. There are a lot of them, and alarmingly I am almost minded to watch another.