“Solo Mio” is the latest film from Angel Studios as they continue to expand their reach outside purely faith-based movies. It was directed by the Kinnane Brothers, Charles and Daniel, who have previously worked on “Home Team” with Kevin James. Though I didn’t go into the movie with the highest expectations, I was pleasantly surprised by what turned out to be a fun little movie. Full of heart and comedy, “Solo Mio” is one of my favorite movies I’ve seen this year.
Solo Mio follows Kevin James as Matt Taylor, who many might know from the viral social media campaign that has been going on since October of last year. He even attended the Super Bowl in character this year to promote Solo Mio. The film starts with him being left at the altar during his wedding in Rome, and all the hijinks that come because of him being unable to cancel his honeymoon plans and thus being forced to go on his honeymoon “Solo Mio” as a character says. Which is complete nonsense in Italian as is later pointed out by someone else.
Kevin James is never an actor that has really stuck out as a favorite of mine, and not someone who I enjoy seeing in a leading role, but his performance in Solo Mio really blew me away. I wasn’t expecting it to be so authentic and funny. One of my favorite bits of the movie is in the beginning when he’s starting out on the honeymoon and there’s a montage of scenes of him doing couples activities by himself like riding a tandem bicycle and rowing across a lake with the most depressed look you’ve ever seen. It is truly hilarious to watch other people’s reactions to him right away. He is a bit typecast as a bumbling idiot, but in a way that doesn’t quite make fun of him like in a lot of his other roles. The naivety and sincerity he has for everything is almost endearing as you watch him struggle through Italy, barely able to speak Italian.
Obviously, an actor can’t carry a movie on his own, and “Solo Mio” has a fun cast of side characters that help make the movie as funny as it is. The other important characters are two other couples on the same honeymoon package as him, and the ways they try to help him through his suffering. One couple is on their third marriage after divorcing twice and the other is a therapist who married her patient. They are overbearing and stereotypical, but they don’t overstay their screentime and mostly help the comedy aspect of the film. There are some other funny recurring bits, like Matt Taylor’s love of Ed Sheeran, and the insane things the side characters say. If I listed every part of the movie I thought was funny, we’d be here a long time. It really is one of the funniest movies I’ve watched all year.
As I said earlier, the movie is full of heart and comedy, so where does the heart come in? The heart is apparent in the romance aspect of the film as we follow Matt Taylor as he falls in love with a cafe worker outside of his hotel, and how he grapples with the fresh feeling of being stood up. Kevin James and Nicole Grimaudo, who plays Gia, his love interest, have lots of chemistry together. Every scene they share is loads of fun as you see their relationship develop into something more than either of them could’ve imagined. Obviously, the film builds up to the conflict of Gia finding out about him being left at the altar days before but resolves in a way that I didn’t expect and really enjoyed.
Overall, this romcom film really surprised me with its quality. It was way funnier than I thought it was going to be and seemed to steer clear of the typical Kevin James formula of jokes. The movie’s romance was also fun and believable in a way that I didn’t really expect. If Angel Studios can continue to put out movies of this quality, the sky is the limit for them.
Four stars.
