Worth: $13.00
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Camila Mendes, Archie Renaux, Marisa Tomei, Lena Olin, Anthony Head
Intro:
It’s a little bit Hallmark, a little bit Disney princess, and a little bit fun.
Lowly art history major and museum intern Ana Santos (Camila Mendes) gets a shot at the big time when she’s asked to accompany the museum director Claire (Marisa Tomei with the most intriguing accent we’ve heard from her since My Cousin Vinny) to London for an auction. An attempt at sabotage by jealous office rivals lands Ana with an economy ticket on a red-eye flight, but before jetlag can ruin her chance at happiness, she is upgraded to business class by a sympathetic airline employee.
The upgrade has ripple effects across both her career and her personal life when very attractive British fellow passenger William crosses Ana’s path quite literally and she manages to accidentally douse him in tomato juice and vodka.
This might sound like the traditional meet cute set-up but surprisingly Upgraded has more to offer than the generic romcom, although it’s undeniably cut from the same cloth. It follows in the footsteps of its many predecessors that centre around a working girl trying to make it in the big city, but Ana’s career isn’t just a building block to meeting the love of her life. In fact, this is first and foremost Ana’s story, with a solid quarter of the movie flying by introducing Ana as a fully rounded character with friends, family and a dream job on the horizon before William even enters the picture.
It’s something of a Cinderella story at heart, complete with a wicked stepmother in Claire, with her impossibly high standards; while her two ruthless personal assistants serve as the evil stepsisters, out to sabotage Ana at every turn. We even get Lena Olin as William’s glamorous mother, and Anthony Head as her famous artist acquaintance stepping into the role of co-fairy-godmothers, leaning joyously into their eccentric artiste characters, eating up every crumb of scenery and having a delightful time of it. Unfortunately, this fully fleshed out cast of side characters leaves very little space for William, the prince of our story, to shine.
Played with genuine charm and appeal by Archie Renaux, William is something of a pushover. He spends the first half of the movie being led around by the much more vibrant women in his life, and any accomplishment he does manage to achieve for himself somehow immediately becomes all about Ana. Poor William is the supporting character in his own life, but somehow, he never does seem to begrudge anyone for that. In fact, it’s his quiet perseverance and good-natured support that stop him from fading into the background entirely. The Emmett Richmond to Ana’s Elle Woods, to put it in romcom terms.
Camila Mendes, on the other hand, is thriving. After years of navigating the dynamics of an ensemble cast in Riverdale, she’s building a solid repertoire as a romcom lead, pulling off that tricky balance between second-hand embarrassment and perky confidence, innate to these roles.
The Duel screenwriters Luke Spencer Roberts and Justin Matthews team with Christine Lenig to deliver this light-hearted reworking of the typical girl-meets-boy fare, playing around with traditional happily ever after tropes and making the real romance of the story a will-they-won’t-they between Ana and her dream career. An enjoyable treat that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and an easy way to let your brain coast on autopilot for a couple of hours. It’s a little bit Hallmark, a little bit Disney princess, and a little bit fun.
