You, Me, & Tuscany is its own micro-miracle, a pure romcom where its protagonist isn’t jaded by romance, has no impulse to deconstruct the modern relationship, and isn’t forced through any preliminary Hinge date humiliation ritual. Here, all we need are two very charming and attractive people – Halle Bailey and Regé-Jean Page – and the soft, undulating hills of the Italian countryside.
It’s utterly predictable from the moment Bailey’s Anna, who gave up on her dreams of professional chefdom, impulsively follows through on her mother’s dying wish to visit Tuscany and chases a one-night stand, Matteo (Lorenzo de Moor), back to his hometown. He’s not there. His entire family is, however, including his mother, Gabriella (Isabella Ferrari), with her Sophia Loren grin, and his skeptical nonna (Stefania Casini), a chronic eavesdropper and eyebrow lifter. They’ve all assumed Anna is Matteo’s fiancée, a ruse which is soon complicated by the arrival of Gabriella’s nephew Michael (Page).
There’s something quite lovely in all this familiarity, partially because director Kat Coiro and screenwriter Ryan Engle show no hesitation in cranking the years back to the comparatively naive My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002) era, with its Nia Vardalos cameo and lightly stereotyped but fond depiction of European airs. One family member (Stella Pecollo) claims, “having a side piece is key to a healthy marriage”, while Anna’s taxi driver (Marco Calvani) drives with a sandwich permanently attached to one hand.
The romance is largely location-driven, with due credit paid to Audrey Wells’ Under the Tuscan Sun (2003). Sensual grape tasting is followed by sensual bruschetta eating and then by sensual barrel racing. Michael tours Anna around the vineyard – where she reveals herself to be a wine savant – before they’re caught under the sprinklers and he whips off his shirt to protect her hair (and the crowd goes wild!). He listens intently to her stories and, when she leaves, laughs softly to himself. Yet he’s told her he’s unlucky in love. He’s married to the wine now.
The stakes are low with a dash of trauma, a recipe for lightness without vacuousness. Not just one but both leads have dead parents, while nonna at one point vaguely alludes to the horrors of Mussolini’s dictatorship.
And Bailey and Page have done exactly what’s required of romcom stars, taking broad archetypes and making them sparkle. Anna’s impulsive in a way that borders on concerning. No one really comments on the fact she breaks into Matteo’s phone to airdrop photos of his house to herself, so that she can then squat on his property and rifle through his drawers.
Bailey is not only one freshly graduated from the Disney school of princesses – she played Ariel in the live-action Little Mermaid – but she’s close to the living embodiment of one, cute as a mouse and indefatigably optimistic. Page, meanwhile, works an angle that was somewhat neglected in his moody Bridgerton breakout: he can do cocky in a way that feels genuinely disarming, with just enough playfulness to his bite.
These kinds of movies are rare these days. It’s even rarer for them to feature two Black leads. But You, Me, & Tuscany thankfully proves that the dating scene hasn’t become so irrevocably grim that there isn’t room in the world for a meet-cute involving a fight for cured meats.
Dir: Kat Coiro. Starring: Halle Bailey, Regé-Jean Page, Lorenzo de Moor, Isabella Ferrari, Aziza Scott, Marco Calvani, Nia Vardalos. Cert 12A, 105 minutes.
‘You, Me & Tuscany’ is in cinemas from 10 April
