Lyndie Greenwood, as Ella, is bright eyed, beautiful and fun to watch. She's a graphic designer who left her Pennsylvania small town for Beantown. Brooks Darnell (just signed by Hallmark to a multi-pic deal) plays her broken-hearted old boyfriend Griffin. He's smooth, dapper and the town's mayor. They make a lovely couple. And they have chemistry. But this movie is as much (and probably more) about Ella's mother (Holly Robinson Peete) and grandmother (Darlene Cooke) and their dysfunctional relationship. And that conflict gets tiresome.
What we've got here is a failure to communicate. Ella and Brooks 2 years before, and Mom and Grandma for, what, forever?
Ella does her best to fix the problem, but it's not her problem to fix (despite what Grandpa Riley told her). And so, for the better part of 2 hours, we watch this fraught mother daughter interaction that could have, and should have, been solved over a couple of glasses of wine.
Momma Micah: why can't we ever use my recipes?
Grandma Tess: I miss Grandpa Riley and now all I care about is work
Ugh. Just talk to each other.
And what's with Chicago? Why would Momma Micah move 500 miles away (and 1,000 miles from her daughter in Boston)? I don't know how much money she saved working in the bakery with her mom but such a dramatic physical and career change is going to cost her some money. If's she really going to open up her own bakery in a new and different city? With no help? And I never heard why?
Still, I enjoyed the second chance romance and the reaffirmation of family values.
Grandpa Riley:
"Do and say everything with love."
"You're stronger together than apart"
