Old friends, resentful exes and missed love connections collide at a wedding in Italy in this minor British romantic comedy.
The unnervingly symmetrical Sam Claflin (Me Before You) stars as Jack, an Englishman attending his sister's nuptials at a lush Italian estate. Tasked with preventing the bride's stalker fling from ruining the event, Jack attempts to drug the uninvited guest into sedation by spiking his champagne glass (!), but when some kids mix up the seating cards, all heck breaks loose.
Jack must also contend with his surly ex (Slumdog Millionaire's Freida Pinto, underutilised) and her jealous boyfriend while trying to reconnect with his sister's American friend Dina (Olivia Munn), the one that got away.
At first glance this seems to be a brazen attempt by Netflix to mount something in the style of British rom-com standard-setter Richard Curtis (Four Weddings and a Funeral, Love Actually), but it's actually a remake of 2012 Italian movie Plan De Table. An aspirational Curtis vibe nevertheless permeates the proceedings with beautiful people sassing each other and a surfeit of British fops bumbling about.
Towards the end of the calamitous second act, the film stops and shows how the preceding 30 minutes might've played out with different table-seating arrangements in an apparent attempt to demonstrate the fickle nature of fate and highlight how we must grab opportunites where we can, etc. It's a moderately interesting idea that ultimately amounts to very little.
