Stranded in Paradise (2014) Vanessa Marcil, James Denton, Cindy Pickett, Gladys Rodríguez, Isel Rodriguez, Alfredo De Quesada Movie Review

Stranded in Paradise (2014)   3/53/53/53/53/5


Vanessa Marcil in Stranded in Paradise (2014)

A Hallmark Hurricane

With the company she works for restructuring, assistant HR manager, Tess Nelson (Vanessa Marcil - The Convenient Groom), has a tough day making people, including a friend, redundant. But having done her job she is surprised to then find herself also being made redundant. In fear that her pushy mother, Mona (Cindy Pickett - Wrapped Up In Christmas), will make her life a misery Tess heads to a human resources convention to try to secure a new job. But the trip doesn't start well with lost shoes, lost luggage and she meets Carter McConnell (James Denton - For Love and Honor), a confident and laid back traveller. When the island gets hit by a hurricane Tess and Carter end up stuck there together with Tess discovering there is more to life than her career.

"Stranded in Paradise" is the sort of fluff that the Hallmark channel is known for, the sort of dime a dozen romantic comedy which whilst entertaining for fans of Hallmark movies has the potential to cheese off those who watch with higher expectations. But whilst for me "Stranded in Paradise" was an inoffensive bit of Hallmark fun it was never more than some stereotypical Hallmark fluff which truthfully frequently became background noise as it offered up nothing new or attention grabbing to keep me interested the whole time.

James Denton in Stranded in Paradise (2014)

As such "Stranded in Paradise" is a movie going through the motions with Vanessa Marcil giving us career focused and driven so her character initially borders on the annoying. We then have James Denton doing tall, easy going and charming, and that means we have chalk n cheese going on, some comical mishaps and caricature like supporting characters. But none of this is new and it is because of its familiarity that it doesn't always hold your attention. But then as much as "Stranded in Paradise" has a storyline it is just as much about how good Vanessa Marcil and James Denton look together and they undeniably have a visual appeal but for me the chemistry is not there to make it work.

What this all boils down to is that "Stranded in Paradise" is just some typical Hallmark fluff which whilst a pleasant distraction for those who like Hallmark movies fails to deliver anything to make it more than just some generic fluff.


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