Watched: 03/01/2025
Format: Hallmark
Viewing: First
Director: Terry Ingram
Job: Assistant Curator at an Art Museum
new skill: walking in 6" heels on grass
Man: Kevin McGarry
Job of Man: philanthropist
Goes to/ Returns to: Stays in Boston
Event: Museum Gala
Food: mac n' cheese
So... apparently - despite starting as recently as 2022 with this movie, The Wedding Veil, there are already 5 movies in the Wedding Veil series, and likely more on the way. I kind of knew this series existed, and was avoiding starting the series so we didn't need to sprint through five movies on the same topic. But we're running out of other Chabert options here on Hallmark as we speedrace our way through her non-Christmas filmography in a way I did not anticipate when I was like "you know what would entertain Randy...". But 2025 has been 2025, so here we are.
Basically, the idea of The Wedding Veil series is something like The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants (which I've never seen). It's about how possession of this 19th century wedding veil will lead to true love. Three friends, who just happen to be played by Lacey Chabert, Autumn Reeser and Alison Sweeney - three of the top Hallmark stars - find and purchase a wedding veil together, all agreeing to share the veil when they find it in an antiques shop in San Francisco.
I call shenanigans that three people would agree to look the same at their weddings in a spur-of-the-moment decision, but here we are. And we *will* get three movies of our heroes getting married, I guess.
This movie has to do the heavy lifting for the series as it has to establish (a) the magical power of the veil, (b) who each of the three leads in the series are, and (c) what their particular deal is with romance. Fortunately, we all know Chabert is up to this task.
While waiting for her flight, Chabert aims to make the most of her solo time in San Francisco after her friends fly out earlier, and while hailing a cab, Chabert meets Man, played by the 6'2" Kevin McGarry., as they try to claim the same cab (like people don't get Uber in SF). With McGarry at 6'2", we have finally cast Chabert against someone whose height I can understand and get an idea of true Chabert scale. The 5'2" listed on IMDB seems right. And now I wonder how tall some of her other costars are.
Chabert and Man find they have much in common, even that they're both from Boston. However, after Man is 100% sure he is going to make it with Chabert, he sees her wedding veil and taps out, believing he's been swept off his feet by a woman who is getting married and just failed to mention it.
Is it stupid? And this is the crux of my issue with this movie. It relies entirely on the movie trope that people experiencing a deep state of confusion while having large things at stake will seek no further information/ allow for a large misunderstanding. It's a classic for when you need a conflict but haven't really written one, and it just makes our leads look stubborn to the point where it's kind of dumb.
In this movie, the mere sight of a wedding veil is enough to make Man run for the hills, as he assumes the veil he sees from afar indicates Chabert is getting married despite a lack of ring or mention of a boyfriend/ fiancé. This leads to the guy acting like a dismissive asshole - which, honestly, is a huge red flag that the movie doesn't deal with. I don't know if a woman being sexually unavailable is a great reason for you to dismiss her and treat her like persona non grata to begin with, but, also... throwing a temper tantrum in general because you can't have something sucks.
Turns out he's fabulously wealthy and a famed Boston philanthropist. He is also working with the very museum where Chabert works to help put on a gala. And dreams of teaching kids about art? So he keeps creeping on the woman he believes to be engaged and then throwing little tantrums whenever he sees evidence that tells him she's engaged.
Of course, there is a wedding Chabert is involved with (of Fiona Vroom, a Hallmark star who is always a side character but seems like she could be a lead) that throws some confusing messaging, but dude still just does not ask.
Rightfully, Chabert does have a scene where she's basically saying *I tried, but @#$% this guy*, which way, way more of these movies need.
Our hero of the film is really Jason, the scheming *other* assistant curator, who wants the one job that is opening up that he's competing for with Chabert. He's an absolute shitheel for absolutely no reason, and the actor behind this role seems positively lost at all times. Like he was working craft services, they needed someone and he's surprised to find himself in the movie, but he's delivering these lines nonetheless.
Anyway, Chabert is responsible for a fundraising gala. While looking for a decoration, she finds a lost painting in the basement in a way that actually does reflect how this sort of stuff tends to happen when paintings, etc... get misplaced. Anyway - it's an important painting and becomes the central focus of her gala. Everything works out, they get married. And Chabert finds out the very painting she was restoring is magically of a bride wearing the very veil she and her pals bought together.
Things of note in the movie:
- Man tries a Boston accent. It's a little Mayor Quimby-ish.
- The Museum is clearly a house and they just stuck up pictures
- The sound is clearly caught without ADR as the floor of the museum is wood, and you can hear people clomping around in their heels. Like, you can hear people approaching before they walk into frame. I don't think I've ever seen that.
- The three friends do Zoom together, reminding you that the other two characters exist and are important to Chabert
- They let Chabert look disheveled, which is new
Anyway, for a movie about someone finding true love, I don't like this guy at all. He seems like a bad person. He is not good enough for this, or any, version of Lacey. Really, his most redeeming quality is that he's wealthy. Which is also a problem.
And... yeah, as a person these movies are not aimed at, you kind of keep wondering - Chabert's character is kind of Hallmark flawless. She has to be single or the movie doesn't work. But this guy is like a walking red flag in so many ways as she tells anyone who will ask how he "runs hot and cold", but *no one is critical of him*. No one *challenges her to challenge him*. They just hum, and/ or they keep telling her he's great - Vroom is all but physically pushing her at this guy despite the fact he's acting weird pretty consistently.
Friends, know the signs. When a dude is a rage monster before you even start dating, that's a bad sign. And somehow the Christian Grey-ness of it all is something that is in there, and I couldn't quite shake it.
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