#then he ends up being the biggest nerd (lovingly) once you actually get him talking

[deadhands69]

Okay, but white haired Shigaraki has hottest guy at the metal show who you really wanna talk to then you finally work up the courage to say hi and he's just like "uhh hi?" and super confused as to why you'd want to talk to him vibes.

[loverunderwater]

Falling Inn Love (2019) dir. Roger Kumble

summary:

When city girl Gabriela spontaneously enters a contest and wins a rustic New Zealand inn, she teams up with bighearted contractor Jake Taylor to fix and flip it.

1.5 stars

Spoilers, duh, but you can enjoy this movie even if you know exactly what’s going to happen next, just like how everyone who watched it for the first time did. In fact, you don’t even have to read this review to guess what happens in this film. Without reading spoilers beforehand, you could probably guess 90% of the unremarkable plot points in this predictable and bland rom-com.

My biggest general problem with Falling Inn Love is that every single character has absolutely no personality. On top of that, each aspect of their personality (or lack thereof) is pretty much only included for the sake of furthering the plot. I’m pretty sure if you took away the characters’ main defining features, you would have the amount of fucks the writers put into developing their characters. They’re just not appealing, relatable, or interesting.

For example, the main character herself. Gabriela’s entire backstory is that she broke up with her boyfriend Dean. That’s literally all we get. You could not ask me to describe what I think Gabriela’s views on orgies, communism, or vegans look like. I should be familiar enough with the character to answer at least one of those. If I had to, I’d say she appreciates vegans, but that’s only because her entire personality is green housing and renovations and clean solar power and energy efficiency. You could not tell me if she planned to secretly run away from home as a child, but at least I know she brings her iPad to dinner with her boyfriend to show him her closet renovation ideas. This is a biiiig example of characters only being the way they are in order to further the plot, but also an example of the writers’ irregularity of bringing backstory into the story. Gabriela’s save-the-planet can-do attitude is only ever applied to the inn, when she decides to stay and renovate it into a clean energy facility. Not when she’s driving her clunky, CO2-emitting van all around town to places to which she could easily walk, which I’m sure is like the top biggest tip to saving the planet—to walk, bike, or take public transportation. Minus ½ star for hypocrisy.

The one thing I could tell you about Gabriela, besides that she sure does love her solar panels, is that she has an awful amount of Main Character syndrome, where she believes everything is about her and the entire world rotates around her. I’m fairly sure that wasn’t the writers’ intention, but they sure projected a ton of pride and self-esteem onto a pretty lackluster character, making her seem conceited. When Jake bumps into Gabriela at the hardware store, she says, “Why are you everywhere that I am?” Seems like she’s got a lot of confidence in her importance and relevance to Jake for someone who has no personality!!!!! It could just be a small town and Jake’s just minding his own business and knowing more about home renovation than Gabriela, which she finds annoying because she’s a strong, independent woman who takes no shit from men.

Charlotte is probably the world’s most pathetic villain. Her hobby is owning a hotel filled with porcelain dolls that belonged to her mother and the stink of old people breath. That’s all we know about her. Oh, and she really, really, really wants to buy the Bluebird from Gabriela because she’s an inn supremacist and believes only she can host an inn that restores the value of tradition and honesty to society. It’s so sad.

Jake has no personality. His backstory is that his girlfriend died 3 years ago and so he’s reluctant to love. That’s a new one. I wonder where the writers came up with that. He likes possum taxidermy because it reminds him of his grandmother. He likes to help out literally everywhere, for free, because he’s just such a nice guy. That’s all there is to him.

Even in Harry Potter, where you could clearly sort each member of the Golden Trio into a very obvious stereotype, you could still find more in-depth characterization beneath. Remove Hermione’s book-nerd, know-it-all personality. Underneath, she’s still a sassy, exasperated girl who cares for her friends and would choose them over anything. She’s flawed, and will act on her annoyance in rash, but calculated ways. Remove Ron’s comedic best friend, runt of the pack personality. Underneath, he’s loving and loyal, and is tired of simply being seen as the nobody. Finally, Harry himself, who beneath the Chosen One archetype, is snarky and witty and driven. Though fairly common and typical, there are multiple layers to these characters, which you just don’t get in Falling Inn Love. But Han, you say, that’s the appeal of a rom-com. You get to see how characters react to specific tropes. Fine, but I raise you this: pacing errors and plot convenience (woo alliteration!).

Similarly to the previous point, not only do the characters’ personalities seem to serve no purpose but to create a coherent plot, but in fact, almost everything that occurs in this movie seems to just happen out of thin air. There is literally no reason or motive behind any of the plot points, which is an indicator of a very weak story. It’s as if the writers had two plot points laid out— “Jake and Gabriela kiss” and “Gabriela decides to stay in New Zealand because she discovers she loves the Bluebird inn”— and halfassedly crammed in as many of the most contrasting tropes as they could find underneath a Wattpad novel from 2013 titled Falling for the Jock. Minus 1 star for plot convenience.

Gabriela’s boyfriend Dean is a douchebag. He is always on his phone during dates, cannot shut up about his job (Man, that sure does sound like someone else we know) and is always having his manager make decisions for the both of them. But Gabriela doesn’t break up with him beacuase he’s inattentive and ignorant. She breaks up with him because he doesn’t want to move in with her. Not wanting to move in with someone is a perfectly valid opinion to have, and Dean even gives a good reason: he’s happy with the things are now. And sure, you could break up with a partner if you felt strongly enough about things, but it would have to be a mutual understanding, an agreement that your lives were being hindered by this decision, or a realization that you both want different things. When Gabriela dumps Dean, it is entirely her end of the rope that is left hanging. It doesn’t feel like a satisfying ending to the first chapter. It feels forced, and that’s because they need Gabriela to apply for the Win an Inn scam. If Gabriela had dumped Dean because he didn’t put enough effort into the relationship, at least we would have felt happy for her, knowing that she deserved better. But because she dumped him because he didn’t want to move in with her and her eco-friendly dishwashers, we’re left thinking, Wow, that was pathetic.

There’s also a scene where Gabriela’s close (and only?? we’re not led to see any of her other friends, but then again, maybe she has none) friend tells her to give Dean an ultimatum—that’s what she did to get her boyfriend to propose to her. This is supposed to look like bad advice from an unqualified friend, since later the same friend tells Gabriela that she’s attending couple’s therapy with her fiancée, because apparently forcing your partner to either marry you or break up with you could lead to trouble in paradise. Who knew? Even though the movie makes it appear that ultimatums are not what to do in a strained relationship, that’s essentially what Gabriela does internally to Dean. Move in with me or we’re done. Minus ½ star for hypocrisy.

Falling Inn Love is supposed to be an enemies-to-friends-to-lovers story. But the pacing of Gabriela and Jake’s relationship is so out of control that it doesn’t seem realistic at all whatsoever. They go from being at each others’ necks constantly, always exchanging cliche retorts, to smiling lovingly at the other in the span of two minutes. Once again, nothing happens to spur on this change. All of the sudden, they’re acting completely civil to on another and now there’s a romance out of nowhere. It’s not realistic or believable.

The climax of Falling Inn Love was probably my least favorite part about it. After Charlotte’s creepy doll hotel is burned down, she, Jake, Gabriela, and the contractor meet to discuss the selling of the Bluebird. And oh boy. After 90 whole-ass minutes of Gabriela claiming she wants to sell the inn, she suddenly gives a Dramatic and Raw speech about keeping ahold of what’s precious to you. Actually, I’m not completely sure if that was she was talking about because it wasn’t worth listening to the entire thing. It was only like 20 seconds, but it was just like every other speech where the main character drastically changes their mind for the better. It was just sad. And after her motivational speech? Charlotte, after 90 whole-ass minutes of trying to buy the Bluebird and get Gabriela to forfeit her inn through most likely illegal manners, nods admirationally and tells Gabriela, “You’re one of us now.” Like, what even happened there? What exactly happened to make Charlotte change her mind? Wouldn’t she want to buy the inn even more now that she doesn’t have one of her own? I know no one with such high demands who would back down that easily, at such a lame speech. For that, Charlotte is a weak antagonist, and lowers the rating by ½ a star, because shouldn’t you despise the antagonist? Shouldn’t you have a little crawling feeling in your stomach whenever they appear onscreen. For me, that was true, but only because she looks like Hannah Meloche and her sickly, whiny voice made me want to throw myself off a cliff.

About halfway through the movie, Charlotte texts Dean from Gabriela’s phone, telling him to bring her back to America if he really loves her. Firstly, why doesn’t Miss Badass have a passcode on her phone?? But when Dean finally arrives to New Zealand to take Gabriela back, there’s no mention of the text. There’s not even a simple “How did you know when the opening launch party was?” “Why are you here? I did not invite you,” on Gabriela’s end, and a “You asked me to take you back, that’s what I’m here to do,” on Dean’s end. It feels like we didn’t get closure on something that was really hyped up to create suspense.

Again, nothing happens to make Gabriela change her mind about keeping the inn. even when Jake is whining to her about being authentic and real and keeeping the Bluebird for the first 7/8ths of the movie, she is adamant in telling him off. And… then nothing happens. Nothing remarkable shifts in their relationship. Nothing remarkable shifts in Gabriela’s daily life. The only thing we can assume is that Jake’s whining has started to borderline on manipulation, and Gabriela feels pressured to keep the inn if she wants to keep Jake. This would be supported by the fact that Gabriela and Jake began to ignore each other when their initial discussion about selling the Bluebird came to blows. Minus 1 star for unsatisfying conclusion.

This movie apparently really wants its happy ending, since almost everything in it is forced to get there. But I don’t know if there’s really much that’s that great.

Overall, I don’t hate Falling Inn Love because I watched it with my best friend over a FaceTime call and we were having fun. But I’m pretty sure if I had watched it on my own I would have clicked out of the tab about thirty minutes in.