Rated: M
Directed by: Analeine Cal y Mayor
Written by: David Quantick & Analeine Cal y Mayor
Produced by: Naysun Alae-Carew, Michael Knowles, Allan Niblo & Richard Alan Reid
Starring: Sam Claflin, Verónica Echegui, Fernando Becerril, Horacio Villalobos and Lucy Punch.
‘You’ve never been in love,’ Maria (Verónica Echegui) tells Henry (Sam Claflin).
She can tell by the way he writes, his novel, ‘The Sensible Heart,’ described by Henry as a book about practical love.
Yawn.
That’s what anyone who’s ever read it thinks.
Until Maria translates the book into Spanish, to become the Number 1 Best Seller in Mexico.
She does more than translate, she re-writes Henry’s passionless vision of love into a sex-romp.
He wonders why Mexican fans are sending him sex-pics.
When he finds out about the changes to his book (he doesn’t speak Spanish which adds to the comedy) he’s mortified. But who cares? It’s selling.
So when his publisher (Lucy Punch) forces Henry to go to Mexico to promote the book (he didn’t write) it’s a comedy of awkward moments as this stuffy Englishman tries to politely give credit to a book he didn’t write while falling in love with the woman who re-writes him.
Book Of Love lives up to the romance of the title with the extra hint of pink font in the opening credits.
Polite and stuffy yet handsome Englishman meets passionate with unrecognised talent, Mexican single mum, Maria.
Classic romantic set-up.
It’s a comedy too (rom-com), lacy undies thrown on stage included. And there’s sheep.
It’s a light-weight viewing that rolls along on sweet moments with son and grandpa Max (Fernando Becerril) in the back of the Volkswagen beetle brought along on tour because they can’t be trusted to be alone. Then there’s the jealous ex with comments like, ‘I promise this is the last time I let you down.’
The humour appealed to my cynicism, so I wanted Maria to succeed.
There’re a few hurdles in this love story to keep it interesting, and a fresh take on the drama that unfolds between new love and letting go of the old. Or not even letting go just knowing what feels right and what is so obviously wrong. And understanding the difference between lust and love; how love is an ideal not a reality, that people are the reality of love and that people let you down. But that passion is also part of love and in the end can lead to one big hot mess but that’s OK.
It all gets a bit unrealistic, in other words a rom-com (what did you expect?!) where I chuckled a few times with the romance sweet without being over cheesy.
