Look, I don't expect a royal romance movie to be first class acting, big budget, and a super philosophical script with complex characters but I do expect a descent effort. This movie could've been so much better had they taken some simple steps to make it believable.
Firstly, I can't get over the language problems. A Norwegian-named prince who speaks Latin, comes from a Britishly named country where they eat decorated Belgian/Dutch cookies. Pick a region, people! It's not that hard. With a minimal amount of effort, they could've easily had names, regional traditions, and the language match. And for Pete's sake, think of a country name that doesn't sound like a butchered mashup of Luxemburg, we all know you just googled "small European countries" and made a word salad. All of it sounds completely ridiculous and it's distracting to any viewer who knows anything about western Europe.
Second, the male lead. Jilon VanOver comes across as a guy, impersonating a puppy. It's weird. He seems fake, you can tell with every look and every word that he's acting. He's trying to be sweet and dreamy but he never really became his character. Was there really no better actor available?
And lastly, who did Cindy Busby's makeup and hair for the gala scene? She looks like she did her makeup while cycling to set. The eye makeup is just two black blobs, the skin looks really sweaty, and the lipstick looks like a 5 year applied it to mommy after picking out an awful color. It makes it so awkward when everybody is looking at her as if she's a princess.
The rest of the movie is pretty standard, exactly what you would expect from a movie of this caliber. I just wish we'd stop with the "big lie" plots. Why do these movies always have to have someone who lies about who they are in it? There are plenty of other drama twists waiting on a screenwriter to use them.
In the end, it all comes down to effort. It is a watchable film, it's okay, but it's littered with "dumb American" mistakes, the ones posh Europeans roll their eyes at, on top of all the other awkward fails. Every single one of them could've been avoided, had the makers just put in a little bit of effort.
