Review: Love At First Sight

Love at First Sight is what it says on the tin - American girl meets cute with English dude, and they struggle to reach the happy ending. Stars Haley Lu Richardson (The White Lotus) and Ben Hardy (Bohemian Rhapsody). Screening on Netflix.Love at First Sight - like Snakes on a Plane and Ruby Gillman Teenage Kraken - is one of those titles in which the entire storyline is mapped out in a four-word title.It also describes the appeal of its star, Haley Lu Richardson, when I first saw her in a comedy-drama called Support the Girls with Regina Hall.Sweet, upbeat, vulnerable, a bit dim maybe - Haley Lu was that out-of-fashion thing these days, the all-American girl next door. She later took those attributes to the highly successful TV series The White Lotus. Love at First Sight clearly aspires to that show's sophistication with its slightly gimmicky narration.Haley Lu Richardson plays American Hadley, while Ben Hardy is English Oliver. Hardy's best known for playing Queen drummer Roger Taylor in Bohemian Rhapsody. The narrator - she also plays an assortment of bit parts - is Jameela Jamil from another smart TV series The Good Place. So, lots of good pedigree, and Love at First Sight starts out with a certain amount of promise. I mean, if the girl meets the boy in the first minute or so, it must be going somewhere unexpected after that, right?And while we wait, we can't deny it's nice to see these two being effortlessly charming as they meet at JFK Airport bound for England.Hadley's father has already fallen in love at first sight, if not in a good way. While working in England, he fell for a colleague, divorced Hadley's Mum and now is about to get married again.So why's Oliver going back home, she wonders?Well, keep on wondering or there'll be no plot at all in Love at First Sight, rather than the bare minimum there currently is. Because there seems to be nothing to get in the way of their instant attraction, you'd think.And the writer/director team - their names, predictably are Katie, Jennifer and Vanessa - belatedly realise they need to throw in a few hurdles. What could go wrong at Heathrow Airport, for instance?Well, Hadley loses Oliver's details at the very moment that Oliver gets into trouble with airport security, and they both dash off in opposite directions.But don't worry - if you were worrying. The odds, as narrator Jameela keeps telling us, and Oliver keeps backing it up, may be against this cheesey romcom reaching its happy ending. But it would take a heart far harder than those of Katie, Jennifer and Vanessa to shatter the dreams of anyone played by Haley Lu Richardson…Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details