Once Upon a Wedding

The story takes place on a Caribbean Island ruled over by the Commandante, a fifth generation dictator. His beautiful, but sheltered daughter dreams of what life would be like outside of the diamond leash she is on. When she accidentally hits a village boy with her car she soon finds herself falling in love and questioning if she is making the right decisions to marry the man her father has chosen. I rented this film and it sounded somewhat interesting but I was severely disappointed. While the film making was well done for the most part the story itself was very formulaic and a paint by the numbers. I felt that any crew fresh out of film school could have slapped this together and probably have done a better job. So if you are into prince and the pauper romantic comedies mixed with a little bit of fantasy you'll enjoy it, otherwise pick another film.

This movie was on Showtime today, and I was surprised at how good it was--I'd never heard of it. A. Martinez is just hilarious playing the, shall we say, "delusional" commandante. Esai Morales is a great comedy villain, and the young romance is gentle and sweet.

Like "The Fantasticks," there's an innocence to the goings-on, and when the Commandante's daughter finally sees the poor side of her island, her eyes are opened. Gives the film a lovely Capra-esquire quality, when the classes bump against each other in a great comedic clash.

It won't bump the greatest movies of all time off the list, but it's a lighthearted romp with a lot of heart and uplift, a real find.

When I tuned accidentally into this movie as it was broadcasted on french sat-TV , I ended up watching it through even though it was available only in dubbed version (which I consistently zap in a NY minute...)

When I realized that afterwards, I found several reasons for that :

* While the plot is so simple that the one displayed on the top of this movie's page suffices, and when one doesn't expect a "masterpiece", one can still enjoy a comedy where the characters are almost as caricatural as in cartoons (the good guy, the princess, the dictator, his cunnin'& plottin' assistant, the silly groom etc).

* Of course, in order to achieve that, characters had to be exaggerated as well as stretched to the limits - often beyond !!! - of all kind of realism (still think cartoons).

* When not taken seriously - as it's not supposed to be - this movie can have an effect on people that is not without reminding that of an old Chaplin or Marx Brothers (all things kept in their respective leagues, in a more policed & modest way) for the occurrences of "the absurd" or rather "the very unlikely in such a situation" help take the viewer to other spheres.

* Hence, and since the cast fulfills its comic assignment with honors, and even if this could be said about many similar movies, I can in my heart and soul prescribe a decent dose of this one to the temporarily - at least - depressed !!!

Broadcasted on french TV as : Amour sous les tropiques

despite good efforts by the actors. El Commandante tries to rise above a poorly written script. It felt as if some writers said, hey, let's write a story that takes place on an island or other ideal setting. That way they could have a vacation. And after a few drinks, they tried not to put much effort into the script. They invited a cast who didn't know what was happening. The cast read the script. They rebelled. They they trapped all the actors on the island. Then the writers fish poisoned them until they agreed to complete the picture. They then all went with the Garcia Brothers to the Mambo Cafe. Sorry, Reuben, I'm pretty sure that that is what happened.

This movie is an awesome family movie that even the men will enjoy. A Martinez is wonderful. And the girl who plays his daughter will probably be seen in a lot more movies in coming years. I have to give kudos to actor Esai Morales...You have to have a lot of confidence to wear a mermaid costume....Overall this movie is hilarious and Awesome! The only part i felt bad about was I heard that the cast got sick from eating bad fish. In one of the scenes you could tell that the whole cast was not feeling well...The kids will love this movie as well there is no bad language, violence or promiscuity in the movie. It was very well directed and Like I said the actors were amazing.