Nearly everything in Regal Entertainment’s new romantic comedy film, “Prenup,” is cut from the same cloth as most local entries of the genre.
This doesn’t necessarily mean a bad thing, and could actually be one of its saving graces, but the movie’s biggest concern is way past its cliché-stricken plot — its flawed narrative. The weight of this defect proves to be a lot to bear for the movie’s lead actors, as the string of formulaic proceedings barely helps to establish chemistry between the two, but once the connection is made, almost everything comes out palatable.
Playing a big part in that palatability is the City of New York. At one point, it is probably easier to notice the relishing cityscape shots that scream “love” and similar terms all over, than those moments that try to create a romantic rapport between Sean (Sam Milby) and Wendy (Jennylyn Mercado), and on another, when Sean is already asking Wendy to marry him, it magnifies the intent of the moment and make it burst with the sense of “kilig” that it lacks, initially.
This follows a perturbing trend of high and lows in the narrative as it stumbles to further build a solid structure, but there are enough charm and comic efforts to keep us occupied. Jennylyn Mercado is, no doubt, the film’s biggest star, and her endearing character, is what keeping everything tolerable and decent, when everything else is going downhill. Mercado’s believable delivery make her star shine the most here, placing her character both at the emotional and comic cores of the story.
Her powerful performance is accompanied by equally credible supports, most of whom she shares with heartfelt moments that should make you either laugh, or shed a tear. Her charmingly quirky take of Wendy may actually what have finally connected her with Sean’s.
On moments when the proceedings strike as merely encores of what we have already seen, like two families in petty brawl over their children’s unplanned wedding, and two strangers who meet in a trip, and then fall in love with each other, Mercado’s endearing character outshines the cliché, and make almost everything tolerable, if not charming.
Sam Milby’s character seems tailored-fit for him, Melai Cantiveros has an excellent work pulling off some of the key comic moments, and Dominic Ochoa and Gardo Versoza are good too, as overprotective guardians to Wendy.
Jun Lana has a decent maneuver of these characters, and he has pulled off a commendable job as far as direction is concerned.
If it’s all in the story’s conformity to the traditional formula that should make this film a total mess, then I say it utterly deserves the highest number in the scale.
Luckily in the end, it all boils down to the pieces that matter most amid of this retread’s two-hour entirety. It will be not too easy to shrug off the parts where it stumbles, but it won’t be difficult to not fall in love with where it shines.
RATING: 7/10 (JE)
