Chabert Watch: The Wedding Veil Inspiration (2023)

okay, I guess the hat is fine.

Watched:  03/14/2025

Format:  Hallmark 

Viewing:  First

Director:  Terry Ingram

heads-up:  If you're here for 100% Chabert content, I am going to alert you now, Lacey Chabert is a supporting character/ Executive Producer on this movie, and not the star.  But watching the Chabert filmography will mean sometimes she is not the lead.  I know.  I can't believe it either.

Job:  Art professor

new skill:  Social media phenom

Man: Paolo Bernardini

Job of Man: Lace mogul

Goes to/ Returns to:  Stays in Chicago

Event:  Lace store opening

Food:  we're back on Mac n' Cheese

The Wedding Veil Inspiration (2023) is part 5 (of 6) of The Wedding Veil series, and direct sequel to The Wedding Veil Unveiled.  The longer this veil nonsense goes on, the more they've piled in continuity, but like the driest of fan-fiction, it's all just rehashing the original concept while shoving our leads through some standard life-experience.  And, of course, now suggesting that the veil is not just for romance but ensuring its victims procreate.  

It *does* have a pretty good bit of insight at the end that just about had me flabbergasted for a Hallmark movie.  But it also brings in Man #2 and Not-Sarah Sherman as secondary romance victims of the veil, suggesting that its not just women who will be forced into romance by possessing the veil.

Italian Handsome Man Paolo is opening his lace store in Chicago (I think the suggestion is its on the Magnificent Mile) and Autumn Reeser is teaching Art History for Non-Art Majors.  She's also in line to become Department Chair of the Art History Department.  Like all movies, no one involved has bothered to speak to anyone in Academia to ask "hey, how does one become Department Chair?", which is something one could find out.  And if the usual processes are in place here, it is not at all obvious as Reeser is being mentored by a faculty near retirement age.  I won't keep complaining that's not how this works, because sometimes it is.

Reeser also has a grad student Teaching Assistant who is the first "off-beat quirky/ actual nerd" I think I've ever seen in one of these movies.  But, I'm gonna be honest, it's kind of like if a 1980's children's author was deciding what quirky is.  They suggest she's into bug photography which is off-beat, but the way it's treated is as if she eats bugs for a quarter.  She also has (wait for it) kind of short hair, so you know she's a maniac.

Paolo's cousin, Matteo has joined Paolo to work at the lace shop, and he's played by Carlo Marks, who was in a different movie this year, and, team, I did not care for him then or now.

The veil is on display the night the store has its opening gala, causing god knows what havoc with the people of Chicago.  But, of course, we know TA and Man #2 are going to fall for each other, and they do, but it's not interesting.

Meanwhile, a video her TA makes of Reeser giving an impromptu lecture on the veil goes viral, as well as secondary video.  She's apparently super engaging online.

Sadly, Handsome Italian Man's father is taken ill and he must return to Italy the very night his store opens.  The two key storylines for Reeser become (a) that Man realizes he must stay in Italy to run the family business and (b) that Reeser is frustrated with the tests and trials of the outgoing Department Chair.

And here is where the movie kind of surprised me.  (SPOILERS)  The Chair admits she was running little tests on Reeser not because she didn't think she couldn't handle being Dept. Chair, but because she knew she'd hate it once she was in the position.  The chair knows Reeser is a teacher and educator at heart, not an administrator.  But!  she says, telling someone their dream is a bad fit for their actual personality usually just makes people double-down.  She wasn't just being a b, she was showing Reeser what the gig is really like.

This ties in with Man's realization he's the person who has to return to Italy to run the family lace business.  And Reeser has to let go of her dream of being a chair, which she just realized she doesn't really want, to go be with him.  But for a hot minute, this movie suggests these two may wind up divorced because of competing needs.

Anyway - the movie isn't plotless, but it feels more like these movies are really a soap opera that's been condensed.  Things happen, but it's serial in nature, making me wonder if Fall of 2025 will see three more of these movies drop.  How many more people can this diabolical veil snare in its trap?

One of the things that's kind of oddball about Hallmark movies is that the stars are getting older, which has been a point of contention and saying so out loud wound up getting one exec the boot (I'm sure there were other factors).  But...  it does put us in this space where our leads are getting married and having first children, and they're all over 40.  So I kinda get the point of why this is a challenge.  But you also don't have 32 year old scholars usually getting tapped to be a Department Chair.  

People jump on planes approximately 10,000x in this movie.  Everyone is doing very, very well, I guess, because they all have no problem booking last minute flights if their friends are sounding down.

these people stop for a minimum of one us-sie per movie

Anyway, I'll shut the f up before I wade into people's personal territory and get in trouble.  I'm just saying there are stories to tell about people of every age as Hallmark has brands in each of these actors and fans that will follow them.

What Reeser does decide to do is return to Italy with Man and work on becoming a sort of documentarian/ YouTuber making videos about art being everywhere - which sounds not half bad, tbh.  And, she shows up at her TA's wedding at the end of her first trimester.  The veil strikes again!