Falling in Love in Niagara - Hallmark

I have so many conflicting feelings about this movie. On the one hand, Niagara Falls makes for a stunning setting for a good love story. But what happens in the first 30 minutes of a movie can really set the tone for the whole thing. What kind of tone did this one have? Oh my… The characters, in the beginning, were so awful I wanted to turn it off at the 30 minute mark and walk away. But I endured to see how it would play out. And shockingly, it had several redeeming moments. Were they enough to save the movie? As usual, I’ve got a lot to say about this one so let’s dive right in and talk about it!

Falling in Love in Niagara, starring Jocelyn Hudon and Dan Jeannotte, premiered on Hallmark Channel on April 20th.  I first saw Jocelyn Hudon in the short-lived series, When Hope Calls. It’s really a shame that the series only lasted one season, I thought it had a lot going for it. She was also in Romance with a Twist earlier this year. I’ll put a link to my discussion on that movie right here, if you’re interested. I remember Dan Jeannotte from The Royal Nanny, which I have to admit was unexpectedly fun, and most recently he was in Sense and Sensibility. Now there’s a movie with reviews all over the place. Here’s a link to my thoughts on that one as well. You just might be surprised by what I had to say this time. I know I was.

So, Falling in Love in Niagara opens first thing in the morning, starting with Madeline, played by Jocelyn Hudon. It’s 6am in San Francisco, and we see she wakes up very alert, practically peppy, and most definitely organized and structured! It’s a bit over the top, but it’s obvious they were trying to make a point here.  In stark contrast we also see Mike, played by Dan Jeannotte, waking up that same morning but it’s 9:17am where he lives in Niagara. He appears to have overslept, he’s not in a good mood, and his room is a nasty mess. Clearly these two are polar opposites. And, these two characters have not met, yet.

While Madeline is fixing herself breakfast with all of her neatly labeled groceries for each day of the week, her fiance walks in. He doesn’t live there, but he’s on his way to work to give an important sales pitch and he’s frantically looking for what he calls his “lucky” socks. Apparently, she took his laundry to do for him because she doesn’t like the way he does it, and she threw away his lucky socks. Meanwhile, while his mind is solely focused on giving an important presentation that day, her mind is focused on planning their honeymoon, which is 5 weeks away, in Niagara. The two of them are both talking on and on and on and neither one is listening to the other. 

Now, one question I have already is how can Madeline be so over-the-top organized and structured, and she hasn’t finalized her honeymoon plans which are only 5 weeks away. That makes absolutely no sense to me. Especially one she’s been planning her entire life, which is to recreate exactly what her grandparents did, something she brings up many times throughout the movie. 

And I also understand they were trying to show us her nervous habit of aligning pens everywhere she goes, but why does she keep a stack of pens lying on the kitchen table? And has anyone else noticed they always seem to be the same pens that she aligns in every scene? I’m just saying. 

We were back to Mike again. A grown man skateboarding to work where he hurries into a place called Henley Tours Niagara. Apparently he has 4 minutes to spare before he has a scheduled phone call, with Madeline by the way, to discuss her honeymoon plans. 

Now, for as controlling and Madeline’s character is, Mike acts just as immature and childish. He was grumbling to his boss, Emily, about the prospect of being a tour guide for a honeymoon couple and doesn’t even want to answer the phone. And once he does answer the phone to talk to Madeline, and she tells him the story about her grandparents that she wants to recreate, he doodles a frowny face and rolls his eyes. That was kind of sad, if not bordering on pathetic, because I actually liked her grandparents’ story. I didn’t need to hear it over and over and over again though…

Then we were back to Madeline and her fiancé who met up for dinner. It turns out he didn’t get the account he was hoping for and he flat out blamed her for throwing away his lucky socks. And you know what, I almost couldn’t blame him for that! I get that he was having a bad day and no, he shouldn’t have actually blamed her for not getting that account.  But seriously, how bad must these characters be that Jason, the fiancé, with his lucky socks and all, was so far the most reasonable character I’ve seen! No one else has any redeeming qualities other than Mike’s boss, Emily, I suppose. I actually wanted to turn it off at this point but we were only 6 or 7 minutes in!

That’s right about the point that Jason blew up at her and called off the wedding. So think about this. This is the point in most Hallmark movies where we’re supposed to not like the ex-boyfriend or fiance, right after they break up, but this time I was practically cheering him on! I even saw someone else on Twitter Saturday night post the same thing! 

Although the next scene was kind of funny. Madeline had now turned into a complete mess. Her sister, Harley, walked in the door and looked stunned to see this. What made no sense to me, though, was this scene was actually 4 weeks later!  So was her sister visiting from out of town? They didn’t mention anything about that. But if she lived locally had she really not seen her in the entire 4 weeks that lapsed. 

But I did like the fact that she came up with the idea of the two of them going on the honeymoon vacation together. She called it a Sistermoon, which was a little dorky but at the same time, it worked. Well, Harley talked Madeline into going with her by appealing to her lack of an adventurous side because that is what Jason had accused her of, too.

Now at this point I really liked Harley. She appeared to be the most caring, fun-loving, protective big sister, and I loved her character. But sadly, that changes later on. 

After the two sisters get checked into the hotel in Niagara, Madeline decides to go on a walk by herself. I’ll admit we got to see some spectacular scenery here. But then Madeline sees Mike for the first time playing his guitar on a park bench and she throws coins into his full, hot cup of coffee and it splashes all over him. Mind you she got close enough to him that she should have seen how full his cup of coffee was when she threw those coins.  I honestly can’t blame him for getting mad here. But this starts off about 30 minutes or so of annoying, playground bickering that just grated on my nerves.

And later, when Madeline got back to the hotel, she told her sister about the encounter.  “I met the world’s grumpiest man” and she never even mentioned the fact that she had splashed hot coffee all over him.

So the next day they go to meet the tour guide and yes, this is where they find out that that’s Mike!  And the toddler-like bickering continues on so much so that Mike’s boss, Emily, decides to chaperone them all on their first day touring the botanical gardens. And yes, they pretty much were behaving like kindergarteners fighting on the playground. If you’ve seen any of my other videos you’ve probably noticed I don’t enjoy characters like this. But I still stuck it out.

Later on that evening the sisters go to a fancy restaurant without a reservation and can’t get a table for at least an hour and a half.  Really? Madeline didn’t have reservations on her color-coded, hour-by-hour itinerary? Well luckily another couple, who happens to be getting married the next weekend, offered to share their table with them. They actually become good friends and spend quite a bit of time together over the course of the movie.

Okay now that I’ve vented about the characters. I’m going to shift gears a little bit and talk about what I liked about this movie. Believe it or not, I thought at the very basic level, it started with a good, solid story. Madeline was trying to get over being jilted by her fiance a few weeks before her wedding. And let’s not forget he broke up with her because she was too controlling. And in this next scene we learn that Mike was also still grieving over a lost love. It turns out his last girlfriend broke up with him because he was too lazy. 

So, the theme of this movie is actually very good where these two completely opposite characters come to fall in love with each other by the end of the movie. And you know, once they got over the petty bickering, about 26 minutes in, the movie got much better.

The next morning Harley got called into a Zoom meeting for work so Madeline had to meet up with Mike for the morning without her. They went on a tour of a vineyard. Yes, the same vineyard her grandparents toured, and it was starting to look like they might be learning to get along when they found out the vineyard was closed for a private party. Apparently Mike had made a mistake and accidentally booked the tour for the following week. They had one last blow-up fight over it when they sat down to cool their tempers and finally started talking like civilized humans. 

Mike was even successful in getting the idea through to her that they could still have a great day even if every detail wasn’t planned down to the last minute. And what he really wanted was to give her an adventure tour.  I mean yes, he is quite knowledgeable about the botanical gardens and the vineyards, but he prefers adventures. He also appealed to her “make-him-jealous” side suggesting she show off pictures on social media of her having a great time without Jason, the former fiancé. 

So this is when the movie finally came around for me. As it turns out, the other couple getting married soon wanted to hire Harley as a photographer for the week. Although why they were a week away from their wedding and had no photographer booked I’ll never know. But it worked out for the story so that Madeline and Mike had some one-on-one time having fun in Niagara Falls.

Of course the very first thing he starts her out with is riding a Zip Line! Whoa! I’ve never even ridden a zip line but it actually looked like so much fun. Then they had lunch together and I could finally feel the chemistry starting to develop.

The next day Mike made her an itinerary for the week. I thought that was so sweet and she was so excited. But, as he pointed out, he left room in there for some spontaneity, too. They rode a cable car over the water, went riding in a whirlpool jet and got completely soaked, and even slowed things down later in a Ferris Wheel.

Once these two characters finally connected and discovered how much they enjoyed each other’s company, I loved how they complimented each other so well. This is where the storyline was really good because they brought out the best in each other, and their differences made them that much better when they were together. For example, besides the obvious fears that Mike helped Madeline overcome, she also inspired him to clean up his act a little bit and even get out and sing in public again.

But, there was a side-story I could have absolutely done without, and that has to do with Harley’s issues. As I already mentioned, she was hired to be a photographer for the wedding couple for the next 5 days. And on one of the days the bride was trying on wedding dresses. Don’t even get me started on a bride not having a dress a few days before the wedding. But Harley, who has been through a divorce, actually had a panic attack seeing the bride in a gown and she literally ran away. That did absolutely NOTHING to help this movie. And now, one character whom I liked in the beginning, nope! That was it for me.

They also threw in a scene with some karaoke, which was okay.  There was nothing spectacular about these scenes and I honestly didn’t care for the singing, but I understand this was necessary for character bonding. Which clearly worked well, especially with Mike and Maddie. 

There was one more scene I didn’t care for where Mike ran off the stage when he was supposed to be singing. Did I mention this movie is full of ups and downs? Yeah, this one ran the gamut! 

But you know what, after that last dip in judgment I really liked how the rest of the movie played out. I didn’t even have a problem with what became the critical moment near the ending when Jason came back. Believe it or not, I’ve been in that very same situation and it’s so hard not knowing if you‘d say yes or no when someone you believe you truly love asks for a second chance. That’s a situation I don’t think anyone can truly know what it’s like unless you’ve actually been there, so I honestly can’t blame her for being confused and initially making the wrong choice.

Happily, though, she sees the error in her ways and ends up with Mike at the end. You all knew that. It’s Hallmark! And that look on Mike’s face when she came back gave me some goosebumps. I was quite impressed with Dan Jeannotte’s acting here. I could really sense Mike’s pain in his face earlier when she told him she was leaving and then the pure joy when she came back.

Wow, this movie took me on a bit of a roller coaster ride! So, was all of that really a good thing after all?  I mean how in the world do I rate this one?  For the first 20 minutes or so I was convinced this was a 1 or a 2. Then when it got better I thought maybe it’s a 3. But now I’m thinking maybe it should be just a little higher because clearly I have strong feelings about this one and I loved the ending. 

Well, on IMDB I’ve found that most average Hallmark movies sit in the low-to-mid 6 range, like 6.2 to 6.5. I think a 6.6 to 6.9 falls above average. And anything higher than a 7 is definitely one of the better ones. So does that mean a 3 out of 5 for me makes it a 6.0 on IMDB? If so, then a 3½ from me would be a 7 on IMDB. I don’t know, overall is this movie worth that?  Or maybe I just need to stay off IMDB? I don’t know. I’ll keep giving this some more thought. I really did feel the chemistry between Maddie and Mike and I really enjoyed the ending! So okay, I’ll give it a 3½. 

How about you? What did you think? Was I being petty complaining about the characters being petty? Maybe I am, but I am being honest and calling it as I see it. That’s part of what this is all about. Sometimes I’ll love them, some weeks not so much.  

Well, I think it’s time I wrapped up my review of Falling in Love in Niagara. Coming up next week we’ll be watching the premiere of Branching Out with Sarah Drew from Guiding Emily. I’m really looking forward to that one! And then the following week we have another star from When Calls The Heart in her own movie. In this one we’ll see Andrea Brooks who plays Faith Carter in A Lifelong Love.

As always, thank you so much for being a part of the Magical Movie Club. We’ll be back next week to chat more about our favorite Magical Movies!” 

Hallmark Channel's Original Preview:  Falling in Love in Niagara - Preview

Hallmark Channel Movie Site: Falling in Love in Niagara