THE MOVIE WAFFLER

4****

The titular character of Christopher Tedrick’s rather charming romance April Flowers (April - Celina Jade) is a romantic, an idealist who believes that ‘artsy’ is a virtue in a potential partner. In a ‘How Hipster Are You?’ Buzzfeed quiz, April is going to get all greens; a hobbyist photographer who finds diners romantic for their ‘history and simplicity’, she once dumped a fella because his sleeve tattoo ‘failed to hold any special meaning’… No wait, come back! Because despite all that, April is really quite sweet, with Jade’s Hepburnisms (Audrey, not Katherine) imbuing the character with an appealing delicacy, a whimsy which in turn inspires April to seek out the owner of a handwritten leather bound journal that she finds on the subway. The little book is chock full of exactly the sort of handwritten poetry which daydreamers like April fall for. No shade meant: I’d be the same, filling my imagination with idealised visions of the person behind the page, embroidering images fortified by my own aspirations and hopes, and probably allowing this projected fancy to hijack the concrete every day details of my life, as April subsequently does here (for the romantic, reality is never quite enough).

April’s quest starts off in the realms of the wacky. Her first port of call is Craigslist, wherein she somehow accidentally posts the details of the journal upon a message board devoted to sexpeople who like role playing! Awkward hilarity ensues when April meets up with some jolly perv who can’t believe his luck, but, sadly, it transpires that he isn’t actually the poet (the clever voiceover that narrates the story suggests lovelorn April’s mistake was probably Freudian). There are lots of other funny lines in this early part of the film too, with April complaining to her de rigueur wacky BFF (Laura, played by Kate Middleton in a superb supporting role) that having it off with a bloke who had shaved all of his body hair was like ‘cuddling an alien’, hahaha!

Laura’s life, as witnessed by April, seems dull and settled, with her older pal constantly shouting at her kid to tie her shoelaces. What is love? It’s perhaps not this, the film suggests; family and picking up after little children. April seeks poetry and excitement, the imagined ideal of the mysterious journal’s author in shimmery longshots (as played by Keir Dullea!). So, it’s a real shame when she starts up a relationship with Jared (Jon Fletcher), a food bank worker and passive aggressive egotist that the film seems to think is a viable real world alternative to April’s dream man. Jared the jemble gets jealous over the journal, bores on about old soul records, and, annoyingly, insists that April does that thing where she closes her eyes and falls back into his arms so he can catch her. Jared pal, it’s a date, not an office team building exercise: but then he does smugly admit that he ‘just wanted to checThe titular character of Christopher Tedrick’s rather charming romance April Flowers (April - Celina Jade) is a romantic, an idealist who believes that ‘artsy’ is a virtue in a potential partner. In a ‘How Hipster Are You?’ Buzzfeed quiz, April is going to get all greens; a hobbyist photographer who finds diners romantic for their ‘history and simplicity’, she once dumped a fella because his sleeve tattoo ‘failed to hold any special meaning’… No wait, come back! Because despite all that, April is really quite sweet, with Jade’s Hepburnisms (Audrey, not Katherine) imbuing the character with an appealing delicacy, a whimsy which in turn inspires April to seek out the owner of a handwritten leather bound journal that she finds on the subway. The little book is chock full of exactly the sort of handwritten poetry which daydreamers like April fall for. No shade meant: I’d be the same, filling my imagination with idealised visions of the person behind the page, embroidering images fortified by my own aspirations and hopes, and probably allowing this projected fancy to hijack the concrete every day details of my life, as April subsequently does here (for the romantic, reality is never quite enough).
April’s quest starts off in the realms of the wacky. Her first port of call is Craigslist, wherein she somehow accidentally posts the details of the journal upon a message board devoted to sexpeople who like role playing! Awkward hilarity ensues when April meets up with some jolly perv who can’t believe his luck, but, sadly, it transpires that he isn’t actually the poet (the clever voiceover that narrates the story suggests lovelorn April’s mistake was probably Freudian). There are lots of other funny lines in this early part of the film too, with April complaining to her de rigueur wacky BFF (Laura, played by Kate Middleton in a superb supporting role) that having it off with a bloke who had shaved all of his body hair was like ‘cuddling an alien’, hahaha!
Laura’s life, as witnessed by April, seems dull and settled, with her older pal constantly shouting at her kid to tie her shoelaces. What is love? It’s perhaps not this, the film suggests; family and picking up after little children. April seeks poetry and excitement, the imagined ideal of the mysterious journal’s author in shimmery longshots (as played by Keir Dullea!). So, it’s a real shame when she starts up a relationship with Jared (Jon Fletcher), a food bank worker and passive aggressive egotist that the film seems to think is a viable real world alternative to April’s dream man. Jared the jemble gets jealous over the journal, bores on about old soul records, and, annoyingly, insists that April does that thing where she closes her eyes and falls back into his arms so he can catch her. Jared pal, it’s a date, not an office team building exercise: but then he does smugly admit that he ‘just wanted to check out’ April’s ‘ass’. What an unmitigated git. She should have stuck with the role player - at least he had some imagination. Will April learn to accept what is in front of her, instead of pursuing a quixotic idyll?
k out’ April’s ‘ass’. What an unmitigated git. She should have stuck with the role player - at least he had some imagination. Will April learn to accept what is in front of her, instead of pursuing a quixotic idyll?