Film Review: Amish Romance "Love Finds You In Charm" with Trevor Donovan and Danielle Chuchran

Film Review: Amish Romance "Love Finds You In Charm" with Trevor Donovan and Danielle Chuchran

I know it's a little odd for me to be reviewing a film like this, however, I read the book, Love Finds You In Charm, a few years ago never thinking it would one day become a film, and I'm posting now as a blogger, not a publisher writer. There's a difference, and I always make that clear here on the blog. My reading taste in fiction runs anywhere from Jonathan Franzen, to James Franco's abstract fiction, to Debbie Macomber "porch swing" romances. Over the years I've posted reviews on all of them, including J.K. Rowling's The Casual Vacancy. In fact, I rarely ever read anything in the genre in which I write anymore.

With that said, the general premise of the film, Love Finds You In Charm, revolves around a beautiful young Amish woman, Emma, who begins to question her life in the Amish community, with the young Amish man who wants to marry her, and whether or not she can live such a narrow existence. She reads Jane Austen in her barn and dreams about another life. She's not sure exactly what she wants, but she knows she wants to find out if there's something different out in the world. So her father sends her to Charm, Ohio, where she spends the summer with relatives.

Once in a while a book or film comes along that captures the setting perfectly...with feeling. I'm often disappointed when that doesn't happen, especially with an Amish romance. I have been known to cut across six lane highways after spotting a sign for an Amish farm market, especially if it's in the fall and there are pumpkins, mums, and homemade cheese. In this case, Love Finds You In Charm doesn't disappoint. It actually was filmed on location, in Charm, Ohio, and the setting is portrayed in such a brilliant way you find yourself daydreaming about actually living there. I live in Bucks County, PA, with a lot of equestrian farms and farm markets. But in the fall they don't grow the pumpkins here. They fill a farm with pumpkins from California and let people pretend they are picking them. There's also a strong New York and Philadelphia influence and we often lose a lot of the original charm of years ago as a result. We're kind of "quasi country chic," with million dollar town homes and condos on the river. I didn't see that in this film. I saw the kind of farm life authenticity that takes the viewer away to a world with which they aren't familiar. Pure comfort and escapism.

When Emma arrives in Ohio, on a train that looks as much fun to ride as any farm market is to visit, she immediately meets a young man named Noah, played by Trevor Donovan. If you have followed Donovan's career over the years, which I actually haven't, you'll know he's known for playing a variety of parts and characters. This time, as Noah, Donovan filled the strong hero part perfectly, and you can see that clearly by the expression on Emma's face the instant she steps off the train. There's also nothing vulgar or too intense about it. The portentous scene where they meet is plain and simple, and it shows the beginning of what we hope will be an interesting relationship. Without giving any spoilers, Noah is the beginning of what might become an interesting adventure for Emma. The kind that she's been reading about in Jane Austen books.

It's the little things in a book or film that create the intensity of the "romance" for me. In this case, there's a scene where all it takes is Noah putting a sea shell up to Emma's ear and telling her it's the ocean. Or when he raves about her cheese-making skills and wants to know "the secret ingredient." By that time I wanted to know what it was, too. Again, all done with simple gestures and poignant lines that create the kind of romance we don't see often anymore in films.

However, this isn't about the cheese. The story goes much deeper than Emma's relationship with Noah. While she's working at one of the most wonderful farm market's I've ever seen, she befriends another young woman who is also rethinking her life, but as an "English" woman, not Amish. I once posted a guest post by an Amish man who lives in a place just like Charm, and I've kept in touch with him since then. I'm not an expert on Amish life, but I've learned that the Amish refer to anyone who isn't Amish as "English." In any event, Emma finds a few things in common with this other young woman who is questioning her own life, which also adds a little drama to the story I didn't expect to see...and Noah becomes even more of a hero. 

Then there's a handsome young guy who works as a food blogger who comes to town and runs into Emma at the Farmer's Market. He tastes her homemade goat cheese...chèvre...and loves it so much he wants to do a feature on her in the food blog. It's also evident that he's interested in more than Emma's cheese and Noah's not too thrilled about that. This is all done with subtle comments, glances, and expressions, which you never have to question once. And it's hard to predict what the ultimate outcome will be even when you reach the middle of the film. I don't usually mind it when I can predict the ending of a film or book...as long as it's happy ending. But in this case I really did find myself wondering how it would all wind up. 

If I were to continue I would no doubt wind up adding spoilers and I ate it when reviews do that. I think that's shabby reviewing and it ruins something special for those who haven't seen the film or read the book. However, from the wood cutting scene where Noah slams that log with all his brute force, to the scene where Emma just stares at him with glazed eyes, I found this to be one of the fastest films I've seen in a long time. Back in the 1980's there was a wonderful, classic book titled, "Cold Sassy Tree," by Olive Ann Burns. Burns died right after the book was published. They adapted the novel to film, too. And that's what Love Finds You In Charm reminded me of in so many ways, yet completely different. It's one of those movies you can keep on DVR and watch many times in the future with people of all ages.

The film is being aired on UPTV, Uplifting Entertainment, and here's a link to their web site with more information. It originally aired on June 7, 2015, and they aired it again last night. I don't know much about UPTV but I would imagine they will be airing it again sometime soon. I also did a simple search and it looks like you can watch it online, too. I'm not posting links because I'm not sure if those web sites are legal or not, and with my own experience with book pirates I don't like to take those chances. But if it's not online yet, I'm sure it will be soon enough for those of you who read this blog in the UK and other countries.





 

Film Review: Foxcatcher, John du Pont, Gay Angle

Film Review: Foxcatcher, John du Pont, Gay Angle

I disliked this film...Foxcatcher...so much I'm making this review a stand alone post so I can just get it out of the way. This is just for me to vent. I truly don't like reviewing anything with this tone, but in this case I just couldn't do anything else. And I think that's because there's a passive aggressive homophobia hidden very deeply, one I can't even comment on because it was done in such a clever, obtuse way. 

When I first heard about the film, Foxcatcher, I posted about it here. I added links to that post with information about John du Pont allegedly being gay, and I talked about how I remembered the murder of David Schultz from a local POV because I live in Bucks County, PA. You can go back and read all that. I'm not going to repeat it again in this post.

First, Foxcatcher is one reason why I hate to waste my time going to theaters anymore. I wouldn't have been thrilled seeing this in a hot cramped theater, and frankly, I'm not too thrilled about wasting five dollars on the rental. E-books can be returned for up to five days on Amazon, but I can't get a refund on a film I thought was a waste of time. There's something ironic and unfair about that and I'd like to know who in the film industry made up those no-refund rules and how they are allowed to get away with it when book publishers can't.

I want my money back.

In any event, in spite of all the gay allegations that surrounded the unusual life of John du Pont, none of it was mentioned in Foxcatcher. There were hints, but if you blink you'll miss them. So if you think you might even get a little speculation on the gay angle, you're in for a huge disappointment. Instead, they portrayed John du Pont as weird, quirky, and absolutely obsessed with the game of wrestling. They insinuated he had issues with his mother, with respect to his own inadequacies, and that he carried baggage that dated back to childhood (all speculation). However, even these aspects of the film were toned down so they could concentrate mostly on long, elaborated wrestling scenes that added nothing significant to the characters or the film...unless you happen to be a huge wrestling fan and want those details. And I had to wonder why, in the name of all that is good, was any part of this film nominated for an Oscar.

As for characterization, think Mommie Dearest and the exaggerated way they portrayed Joan Crawford, which is how that film went on to be become campy cult classic. Although I don't think that will happen with Foxcatcher, even the nose they gave John du Pont made me want to smile at certain points in the film. And trust me, there's not much to smile about with this film.  

I know the film was set in Newtown Square, PA because that's what it said, and that's where John du Pont lived. However, I didn't get a feel for the setting even slightly and for all it mattered it could have been anywhere else in the USA. But I think the oddest part for me was that John du Pont allegedly had no one close to him, which is why he befriended Mark Schultz in the first place. And yet we have du Pont flying to huge events to give speeches as if he didn't have one single insecurity in the world. Now I know that could happen, but at least give a slight explanation and a hint of the kind of man he was. After watching this film, I know nothing more about him from what I read and heard about in the news at the time of the murder.

I'm not going to drag this out for long. There were a few scenes where du Pont actually did roll around on the mat with a few of the wrestlers, but nothing that would indicate he felt anything sexual toward them. And I found that hard to believe then, and I still find it hard to believe now. If there was a cover up this film only perpetuates it even more. If there wasn't, I'm not sure there was a need to make a film at all. That's the biggest flaw of the entire thing for me. Why bother? It was a tragic event that took one life and ruined others. But I'm not sure it warranted being retold all over again. So that critics who knew so little about the back story could give this film such stellar reviews?

Here's a link to an article that mentions 11 things about Foxcatcher that were not accurate. Most were new to me when I first read them, so I'm still learning things about this story...even if I learned nothing from the film.

There's this:

In reality, this never happened. In fact, Mrs du Pont was dead before John ever started Foxcatcher. She died in 1988 and only then did John act to redevelop the 440-acre Liseter Hall Farm in Newtown Square as an elite level wrestling facility. He called this new camp “Foxcatcher” after his father’s old racing stable.

And here's the gay part...that was never mentioned:

The film never looks properly at rumours of John du Pont being gay. It does imply that Mark and John may have had a homosexual relationship, but that’s so ridiculous that it’s almost laughable.

The film is very misleading in this portrayal. Mark was not gay and barely had any sort of relationship with du Pont. However, Dave Metlzer does write in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter that “The belief is that there was a homosexual relationship with Du Pont and a wrestler, but not Mark.”

The film therefore covers up what could have been an interesting narrative with a wholly unbelievable story about Mark Schultz.

I don't believe for a moment Mark was gay or that he had any intimate relationship with du Pont. I do believe there was more cover up and the story goes much deeper than we'll ever know. But once again, why bother making a movie about a cover up unless something new is going to be disclosed? Or, center the film on the cover up. Now that would have been interesting. 

And I want my money back. 

Small Town Romance Writer

113,000 Word Gay Romance 

Amazon

Don Jon Film Review; Gay Mayor Atlantic City NJ

Gay Mayor Atlantic City NJ

In what many are calling the beginning of changing times, the new mayor of Atlantic City, New Jersey was recently sworn in and there are several significant facts about him worth mentioning. One, he's gay. Two, he's Republican. And three, he's interested in the concept of giving free land to the poor. He's also the first Republican mayor there in 23 years.

Don Guardian was sworn in as the resort city’s 49th mayor amid a brutal slowdown that has seen it lose its place as the nation’s second-largest gambling market, with casino revenues falling more than 40 percent and thousands of jobs being lost in the past six years. The 60-year-old Guardian warns of challenging times ahead as his administration tries to turn things around.

Not only does this erase several stereotypes, it also shows the world that New Jersey is nothing like you see it portrayed on TV and in films...which of course is highly significant to my film review of Don Jon, below.

You can read more here.

Don Jon Film Review

Over the holidays, I ran across an article I thought was interesting about authors insulting readers by not taking the time to research basic (important) details. This particular article discussed historicals and how some authors ignore historic details to the extreme...at the risk of insulting readers who might know more than the author. When I wrote A Young Widow's Promise I remember researching power mowers, among many things, because I'd set the story during the civil war and the main character turns her front property into a burial ground. I didn't want the main character mowing her front property with a John Deer from Home Depot. That would have been stupid on my part, and because I don't write historical fiction often I tend to take that kind of research to extremes. I also did this same kind of research in the story I wrote for the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic (can't remember the title of that one right now). I spent a couple of days researching corsets worn during the Edwardian period, among other facts I thought were important to get right. Because if you don't get these facts right, at least in the most basic sense, you'll wind up with a film or book like Don Jon filled with misconceptions and stereotypes.

This review contains spoilers, so you've been warned. Frankly, there aren't enough surprises in the film to even care about spoilers. The reason it contains spoilers is because I think everyone should know, in this case, what they are getting into before they spend their hard-earned money. We see the money issue a lot in book circles, and some book reviewers even mention book prices in reviews, but we never see it with film reviews and I don't think that's fair...especially when you consider how privileged those like Joseph Gordon-Levitt are to be garnering millions of dollars at the expense of hard working people, with films like Don Jon. I watched Don Jon on demand and paid 5.99. That's six bucks I'll never see again. And if this film had been an e-book on Amazon I would have returned it that same night. Unfortunately, we can't return films on demand; just books. If it had been a DVD, Tony would have stepped on it.

I had been looking forward to this film because I've been writing erotica for many years and I thought  Gordon-Levitt would treat the subject of porn addiction well. Unfortunately, the film begins with a voice over through the main character's POV (Don Jon) and I had a bad feeling when I heard the overly clichéd outer borough New York accent. But things only devolved from there. As it turns out, the main character is from New Jersey, and the accent turned out to be more like something you'd expect to hear from someone mocking New Jersey accents without knowing a thing about New Jersey or the millions of people who live there. I'm from New Jersey and I don't have that accent, nor do I know anyone in New Jersey with an accent like that. Evidently, no one's told Gordon-Levitt New Jersey is the home of Princeton University. And even in those few sections of northern New Jersey where you might find a hint of the accents in Don Jon they are so highly exaggerated I thought this film might be a parody at first. But it's not a parody. It's supposed to be deep and meaningful, ahem. And if I go any further about how deep and meaningful it is I'll be writing a parody right now.

As the film tries to move forward, the main character is portrayed as a dumb fuck with too much testosterone who spends his time working out at the gym, hunting for pussy, and jacking to free porn clips. But there's nothing sexual about it, not one single scene. And I think if you're going to get into porn addiction this way you should at least know and touch certain topics lightly. In other words, this main character is so into porn he views and jacks multiple times a day, however, he does this sitting at his desk, in his clothes, into a tissue. I'm not joking here. That's the extent to which his addiction goes, and there's no mention of online interaction or web cams, or anything else many people with porn addictions are doing these days. Young men like the character Gordon-Levitt portrays can't wait to show off their bodies with web cams...even if they are more voyeuristic. But this idiotic portrayal of a porn addict didn't even come across as remotely believable because it lacked so much of what triggers excitement in most porn addicts. If they had made him a lame porn addict that would have been different. But they just made him a porn addict in general. Again, there's nothing sexy about the movie either. So if you're thinking of seeing this film to get a glimpse of the body Gordon-Levitt worked so hard to get for this film you'll wind up even more disappointed. There was one scene where he's wearing low-rise jeans that make him look hot, but that's not even realistic because those jeans cost so much the main character would never have been able to afford them in the first place.

So, Don Jon's addicted to sitting in his small apartment while jacking to porn, he spends his free nights cruising bars with straight brainless buds mocking and degrading women in a way that resembles a rape culture mind set, and goes through a string of one night stands without emotion because he prefers porn and tissues to the real thing. Then along comes Hollywood's Missy Right to save the day, he falls batshit crazy in "love" with her, and tries to change his evil porn addict ways. But Missy Right is not only a manipulating, controlling woman with a limited intellect who baits him with sex, and she's such a bad stereotype of all young women she could set feminism back hundreds of years. There's one scene where he's literally panting for sex with her, but she refuses to indulge him and will only let him dry hump her out in the hallway of her apartment building while they are both still fully clothed. I swear I'm not joking about this either. It's the kind of WTF-ery you don't see often. He actually climaxes by dry humping her from behind, both remain fully clothed, and it was the one scene in the film where I actually felt sorry for the main character. But all in all, he deserves what he gets.

While he's seeing Missy Right, he continues to jack at his desk to cheap free porn clips. She eventually catches him, the shit hits the proverbial fan, and she creates this weird scene where it looks more like he screwed her sister instead of watching free porn. She really goes ballistic on him, ultimately dumping him in a following scene just like this one when she catches him a second time by snooping through his browsing history. And while I get the basic premise behind this, scenes like this do nothing for women or the fact that women also enjoy visual erotic fulfillment, too, sometimes. In this film it's as if only men enjoy adult entertainment and anything resembling Fifty Shades of Grey is "mommy porn." There have been articles and rants about this kind of double standard for women and I'm not going into too many details now. The point is the film seems to promote the stereotype that only men watch porn, and women want nothing but emotional stimulation and to watch Dr.Phil. Or worse, that it's wrong for women to enjoy porn. But that's not where the insult to women ends.

Before she breaks up with him, Missy Right talks Don Jon into taking a course. A course will save his life. She has plans for him, oh yes, and she holds sex over his head the entire time to get him to do whatever she wants him to do. Of course he does it. His family loves her, which goes into another cliché of the good woman standing behind the evil porn watching man. While he's taking the course, he meets a slightly older woman who is "different." I would be remiss if I didn't mention the kind of course he's taking is never mentioned, what kind of school he's attending is never mentioned, and his goals are never once mentioned. He's just taking a "course," you know, like the boy goes to college kind of thing to turn his life around. Ugh! I wasn't even certain he'd graduated from high school! In any event, he meets the older woman and she notices him watching porn on his phone. At this point, I thought there might be hope. I thought this might be the relationship that will turn the film into something important and make all the fresh hells I'd suffered through worth while.

But the older woman who had so much potential as a character who can help Don Jon evolve only turns out to be as dysfunctional as Don Jon and they wind up in a creepy relationship that's based on sex, emptiness, and this strange brand of sexual schadenfreude that left me with the feeling they both actually do deserve each other and Missy Right was smart to dump him in the first place. And not because he watched porn, but because he's just a creep.

And if all this isn't enough, the film insults Catholics, too. In an attempt to absolve his sin of watching free porn clips, the main character never misses mass on Sundays (with his family) and he goes to confession once a week. He tells the priest in this old fashioned confessional how many times he jacks to porn, how much pre-marital sex he has, and the priest gives him his penance. I'm also Catholic. I went to twelve years of Catholic school. That's not how it works in 2014.

There are a few scenes with the main character's family and they also portray New Jersey families with the same kind of stereotypical nonsense that's so consistent throughout the film. Tony Danza is in these scenes, and he never seems to leave the dining room (except for church, I think) where there's a huge flat screen TV set up over the buffet so he can watch football in his undershirt, scream like a madman, and insult his son with the same inauthentic New Jersey accent.

It could have been great. It could have been something worthwhile, and I think that's what bothered me the most about this movie. But it turned out to be insulting and immature and I don't think Gordon-Levitt would have done it quite the same way if he'd been older. I think HE should take a course somewhere. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who won't know this when they see the film and once again a bad film will slip through the proverbial cracks because most people won't know any better. Some reviews have been good, more than a few others mimic what I just wrote. I know it's all subjective. But you can't make details and facts subjective. That just doesn't work for those who do know better.

Internationally, the film has grossed over thirty million dollars.