Starring Ashley Williams and Paul Campbell
***SPOILER ALERT***
Natalie (Williams) is heading to a new city, Pittsburgh, where she’ll be working in the admissions department of a university. She’s excited to move into her new condo, which she tells Mark (Campbell), the building’s superintendent, but he couldn’t care less. And the residents are either indifferent to one another or bickering among themselves. Soon Natalie signs up for an Alzheimer’s disease fundraising walk and criticizes Mark for not doing the same. Disappointed by the lack of community spirit among her neighbors, Natalie is determined to bring them together. As she and Mark get to know one another, they strike a bargain: he’ll become more involved with people, and she’ll spend more time taking care of herself instead of others. But trouble erupts after Natalie attempts to recruit her neighbors for the Alzheimer’s walk, which undermines her relationship with Mark.
PROS
The movie was a passion project for Ashley Williams, whose mother died of Alzheimer’s several years ago.
A kind spirit. This film’s heart was in the right place. I appreciated that it promoted getting to know your neighbors and developing community spirit, as well as coming together for a good cause, in this case Alzheimer’s disease. The movie highlighted the importance of fundraising activities to support research. When the walk participants raised their flowers en masse to show that they or loved ones had been affected by Alzheimer’s, this was moving, as it created an awareness of the broad impact the devastating disease has on society. And Linda (Linda Kash) the warm-hearted, caring woman in charge of the walk, who had early-onset Alzheimer’s (obvious when she failed to recognize herself in a photo), was a pleasant addition to this movie.
Paul Campbell as Mark (mostly). The affable actor was terrific in movies like Surprised by Love (2015) and Wedding Every Weekend (2020), and I liked his depiction of Mark, especially once the character got past being prickly and standoffish. Before Mark and Natalie teamed up to support one another’s goals, however, Campbell had too little presence and seemed overshadowed by his ebullient co-star, but eventually the two developed a cute rapport. I enjoyed watching Mark open up to Natalie, particularly about his role in causing his father to be fired as the building’s superintendent years earlier. The character experienced a lot of growth and change. He’d been isolated and cranky at the start but blossomed into someone who helped Natalie bring peace between warring neighbors, and who later took the initiative in doing things (such as making a bench) to help the residents.
Rryla McIntosh. The actress was a standout as Drea, café owner and pie maker extraordinaire. With her playful, teasing manner and colorful outfits, she brought wit and personality to this movie. Hopefully, we’ll see more of McIntosh in Hallmark movies.
CONS
The movie took a while to pick up steam, with not much in the way of excitement until the last third, and it was marred by extreme characters who were rather irritating.
Ashley Williams as Natalie. Williams was excellent in Notes of Autumn (2023), but usually I wish she’d tone down her performances a notch or two. She was either outrageously perky or bursting into tears in Falling Together, and I couldn’t get past the driven, neurotic woman she was playing. Natalie was a one-note character, obsessed with having her neighbors conform to her idealistic vision of how things ought to be between them. Like she said, she wanted to live in a place where people were friendly. We all do, but she tried to force folks together, often with dismal results. Her attempts at parties, including leaf peeping, never got off the ground, and her muffin giveaway failed to attract anyone. She did better when bringing neighbors together over shared interests like art and yoga. However, her mania for trying to fix other people’s relationships was wearing and drove a wedge between her and Mark, who was more of a realist about human nature. And I thought that Natalie’s attempts to control others were often self-serving, not altruistic as the film wanted us to believe. She was satisfying her own needs. There was no genuine character arc here; essentially, Natalie didn’t change from start to finish.
Flip-flopping neighbors. This movie was overflowing with peculiar/unpleasant neighbors—the nerdy sneezing guy, the HOA president who laid down the rules the second she met Natalie, the two young roommates who detested one another, the artist and the mom who bickered over loud music, and the yoga teacher and the businesswoman who argued over laundry. Through Natalie and Mark’s efforts, these people did ultimately come together in peace. They even decorated the lobby, where Natalie held an autumn get-together for them and signed them up to be on her team for the Alzheimer’s walk. Yet when she returned to the get-together after registering her team with Linda, the residents were arguing over Mark’s bench and dissing Natalie for recruiting them to her cause. The rapid turnaround in their attitudes felt forced for the sake of creating drama. Then just as quickly, they changed their minds and participated in the walk, and suddenly everyone was getting along again. This flip-flopping between hostility and friendliness was just too much.
My grade for Falling Together: C-
Caroline Kaiser is a professional book editor who specializes in fiction and memoirs, and she’s been guiding writers toward publication since 2007. Caroline is also the author of two ghostly mystery novels, Virginia’s Ghost and The Spirits of South Drive. Before she embarked on an editing and writing career, she spent many years working in a Toronto auction house as an antiques appraiser. Apart from curling up on the couch and drinking tea as she watches Hallmark movies, Caroline enjoys baking and exploring London, Ontario, the picturesque city she now calls home. Her website is www.carolinekaisereditor.com.
