Ordinary Things

Micah Caronna’s Ordinary Things is a throwback romcom that takes a classically crazy premise of a fake wedding and spins a sickly wholesome love story aligned with the film’s religious origin. It’s a stuttering and unproduced by-numbers feature punctuated by some emotionally engaging moments, but lacking in overall quality.

To fulfil her dying mother’s wish, Dannie (Cristina Duchesne-Rivera) fakes a wedding with her childhood best friend Tyler (Julian Simoes). Convinced to go along with the plot due to a promise made as kids and assurance of a deadline for the charade to end, Tyler begins to embrace ‘married’ life. But when Dannie’s mom (Vanessa Rodriguez) makes a miraculous recovery, he begins to struggle with a counterfeit life. But are the feelings they fake more real than either realise?

Ordinary Things is a corny and affable romcom that is seldom seen in the modern film landscape. Situational and gently screwball, it places its star-crossed lovers in a madcap predicament that ties them together whilst keeping them apart, giving the audience a cause to root for as we watch them try to overcome the blockade of their shared destiny. A modern compare is Anyone But You (albeit a much tamer version…), a film praised for a willingness to embrace the skeleton of its previous-era predecessors openly. Ordinary Things’ successes stem from a similar embrace, its funniest moments coming where Tyler gets to take advantage of his married privileges. Similarly, the story is at its strongest when Tyler’s established feelings towards both Dannie and marriage are placed in conflict, and viewers are asked questions about the arrangement that leads to interesting assessments of each character.

However, the film is neither funny enough to consistently earn laughs from the viewer, nor original enough to really engage them with the plot. The Christian essence of the production isn’t overwhelmingly present throughout, but it is no reach to wonder whether the urge to ensure the film remains family friendly is a reason for why some obvious situational relationship comedy setups are omitted from the film. The two protagonists are also bland and dull, livened at certain times where the film ponders the morality of Dannie’s plan and Tyler’s conflict with it but both largely lacking in any of the required yearning or passion for one another that is necessary for any film of this nature to work.

Outside of its Christian target audience, it is unlikely that Ordinary Things will do enough to leave a lasting impression. It features some entertaining moments that make use of its central ‘fake marriage’ premise and looks good enough for a lower budget production. However it , ultimately lacks anything extraordinary when it comes to story, characters or humour to sustain it through the running time.