Cooking with Love (2018)

Truly Dreadful Film

Touches You

Don't listen to the negative reviews

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Fun story. Characters were likable but not one dimensional.

After several turns as "the best friend" of the heroine, where she all but out shown the leads, Ali Liebert has finally been getting much deserved leading roles in these Hallmark seasonal romances. This one is the best yet. Kudos to Hallmark for recognizing her appeal and giving her prominent roles. I hope she becomes as ubiquitous as Chabert, Reiser, Boston, Polo, and several others.This one is also helped by a tightly woven plot, good character development and an attractive leading man who has a real arc into becoming (or being revealed as) a good guy after all. I must quibble at this point over one plot hole. Our hero, a diva chef, has his career almost ruined by a viral video of him throwing food on a restaurant critic in a fit of temper. He reveals later that the the video edited out the fact that prior to the food on the lap incident, the victim had made his waitress cry by being so mean to her. Why didn't he just explain that on facebook or twitter? Instead of needing an image rehabilitation, he becomes a hero. It is also absent some of the overdone stupid gimmicks that most of these Hallmarks seem to hinge on. No angels, City bad, country good, factory shuttings, time travel, nor I hate (just fill in the holiday). What keeps it from getting a higher rating from me is the lack of depth, suspense, pathos, or super hot chemistry between the leads. But it's good. Really good.Ali has the super nice girl who is maybe a little too nice role down pat. Plus she has the most energetic eyebrows I've ever seen. Very cute, if a bit distracting. Couldn't take my eyes off of them.

Kelly is a producer on a cooking show for kids and when the host is injured she needs to find a replacement as soon as possible. She suggests Stephen Harris, a famous chef, with a famous restaurant who lately acquired a bad reputation so this show is the perfect opportunity to improve his image.I'm not gonna lie: I didn't have a good first impression of this movie. While I thought the theme was original I did find it quite boring and I didn't actually got into it after the first half.The leading actors deliver an acceptable performance given the characters they had. But I didn't connect with any of them. Chemistry? I'm still not sure. I got the sense that they got along just fine but I didn't sense any romantic chemistry between them. I did find two of their scenes lovely but nothing that makes me melt inside like some Hallmark movies have before. There were not any jokes, and while the ending was pretty predictable I was surprised there was no pre-ending drama between Kelly and Stephen.Why is Kimberly Sustad here? She has been in this type of movies as the leading lady and she always delivers.To sum up, this movie is not disaster, but I felt something was missing and I did not enjoy until the second part of it. Did I regret watching it? No. But Hallmark has provided much better material than this.

Ali Liebert once again shows us that she is as good as any other Hallmark leading lady. Her performance was outstanding. There was chemistry between her and Brett Dalton. Kimberly Sustad should have had a bigger part. The only thing keeping this movie from being a 10 is the presence of Jeremy. His part in the story could have been left in and his onscreen presence left out, or better yet casting could have found an actor with actual acting ability for the part. I have seen Preston Vanderslice in other Hallmark productions and all I have seen is more of the same. The children were great. In spite of an amateur (Vanderslice) working with professionals, a really good Hallmark movie. With 1 point lost for casting, my score 9