We follow Andi's (Locsin) struggles, always left behind by the people in her life. Her mother abandoned her as a kid. Her first love Max (Milby) moved to the US to purse his studies. Her last boyfriend scammed her and left the country. Then finding out she's pregnant and with mounting financial issues, she turns to her ex Max having just come back and is now a full-fledged doctor. Madness ensues when she finds out he's now with a fellow doctor named Christian who has been looking at adopting for him and Max, having been together for three years already. With her back against the wall, they come to an arrangement where they will take care of her in exchange for her baby, a much better compromise instead of what she originally approached them for which was to get an abortion.
The performance of the three main stars are good enough for a romcom, with just some minor observations. Sam Milby was the weakest of the bunch, as we can barely get anything from him for the most part. He's a competent actor but his acting was uninspired. Angel Locsin was reliable but you get the feeling that the material was below her acting prowess. She's not necessarily overreacting, but there were scenes where a simple stare or a pensive look would've sufficed instead of laughing hysterically or crying on autopilot. If that's an acting, writing or directing issue, we'll never know. The surprise of the group is Zanjoe Marudo. I'm sure I've seen a couple of his works before and they've been decent but nothing was memorable enough. Here, he stole almost every scene he was in and he really was acting as the controlling boyfriend. I tried to analyze if he was good because he was acting as a straight guy pretending to be gay, but I didn't get that from his performance. I've always wondered why he has lasted this long in the showbusiness. He showed me in this movie why.
When one thinks of a Star Cinema movie, the common description comes to mind: tired, formulaic, predictable and many others, all pointing to the fact that when you've seen one movie from them, there's a feeling you've seen it all. Surprisingly, The Third Party was fun although some of the jokes fell flat, some seemed inappropriate and others were cliché. There were a couple of times where it could've helped bridge the gap and gain more understanding to the needs of the LGBTQIA+ community but failed to take advantage. I can imagine the uneasiness and the awkward reaction of the audience whenever Milby's and Marudo's characters were PDA-ing. Maybe that's asking for too much already from a material that surprisingly even got greenlit, coming from a conservative movie studio, much less get an Angel Locsin signed on. This movie will not change the world, but for the most part it's not a waste of time either.
