Fools Rush In (1997)

Elevator Pitch: Alex Whitman, an ambitious New York architect meets Isabel Fuentes, a Las Vegas photographer in the lavatory queue  of a night club. He is in the city to build a casino. They are attracted to each other despite their cultural differences, but after their one night stand Isabel turns out to be pregnant causing them to embark on a bumpy romance, discouraged by the needs of Alex’s job and the demands of Isabel’s parents. When Isabel gives Alex the impression that she has had a miscarriage they separate, possibly for ever.

Content: the event causing the pregnancy is decorously presented. The couple marry in a ceremony witnessed by an Elvis impersonator. The loiter at various times at the edge of the Hoover dam and within sight of the Grand Canyon. Alex is seen at work dealing with architect type problems. He goes to a barbecue with Isabel’s family and later, after they are married, her brothers repaint his house in bright colours. At various times either alone or together they do a lot of driving and take other forms of transport. 

A View: It is not possible to get away from the basic joke that Mexican families are a bit over the top, and I can’t help feeling that culturally things have changed a bit in the last 25 years. I am an ancient Brit but I love the Mexican colour palate, so I would have been happy in the brightly coloured house. So without that joke the movie would not really have worked. But on the plus side the couple are quite charming. It is a film you might have on while doing something else. 

There are a lot of Romcoms involving mismatched people and babies. Here are three of them: Life as We Know It, The Switch and one of the most successful of all time Bridget Jones’s Baby .