Hallmark Review: Stranded In Paradise (2014, dir. Bert Kish)


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Based on the title you can basically guess where this film starts. It begins at a big company called Connor.com where after a little foreshadowing, Tess Nelson (Vanessa Marcil) is going to end up with James Denton’s character Carter McConnell who clearly lost his thumb in paradise and obviously needs someone to help him track it down. Actually she has been fired because the new boss wants to do some restructuring and she’s going to get the boot. This was shortly before she was going to go to Puerto Rico to a human resources convention since that was her job at Connor.com. Well screw getting fired, she’s going to go anyways. There might be a job there!

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As soon as she gets on the plane is where this movie starts to do things the way I like it. Sure, the plot ultimately nudges these two in a certain direction so that they will end up together, but it never really feels forced, shoved down our throats, or just flat of place. The two of them have a mix up on their plane seating. They both happen to have the bad luck of losing their luggage. They stay at the same hotel. Plot convenient coincidences sure, but nothing feels forced, for lack of a better word. We just spend some time with these characters, and they spend some time together.

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He used to have a job that kept him in one place, but now he does the lecture circuit as kind of a life coach/motivational speaker. She is finding that word has gotten out about her job loss so she is a bit of a pariah. Because the hotel they were both staying at isn’t the brightest when it comes to the construction work being done on it, an electrical fire starts in the middle of the night. Then something happens you’d never imagine. No, not that they both go to a friend’s home who spouts platitudes while a hurricane approaches. No, no, no. She finds a working pay phone in 2014.

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They then both go to Carter’s friend’s home. She used to be a Hollywood starlet, but when that dried up, she moved to Puerto Rico. She would be quite likable if they had dialed her back a little. She is so at peace, so I couldn’t care less about the hurricane, that you’d think she actually wants to die. It really is that bad. I can understand having been through many of them and understand that going into a complete panic is unnecessary, but it’s really like she’s totally oblivious to it. I’m sure you know where this leads.

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That’s right! After the hurricane seems to reverse direction like it’s a car in a different gear, a faked computer screen that uses a local URL shows up. During the hurricane the new boss at Connor.com was trying to get ahold of her. He figured out that with her gone things were kind of thrown into turmoil. Not only was she good at what she was supposed to be doing, but there were things that she was doing that didn’t show up in any paperwork.

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Of course they end up together. She is not only offered her position back at Connor.com, but a promotion to Vice President of Corporate Affairs since she really was doing more than her previous position. This is where I have a little problem with the story. I can understand that Carter would decide that he swung from the extreme of being only in one place all time to traveling all the time, but I’m not sure why she couldn’t find a way to strike a balance between the two. Instead, she goes back to Puerto Rico to catch him at the airport. However, I can kind of still get it because she did hold her previous position for 15 years. That’s a lot of time, and even if it doesn’t make complete sense, I can still buy her making that choice anyways.

This one is worth seeing.

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