'You Me, & Tuscany' review: Halle Bailey and Rege‑Jean Page coast through a glossy rom‑com

Courtesy of Universal Studios

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It’s hard to get anything original made these days, let alone a romantic comedy. Watching “You, Me & Tuscany,” you might assume it’s adapted from a breezy novel or inspired by a well-thumbed paperback pulled from an airport rack. Surprisingly, it’s not. Kat Coiro’s film is an original, written alongside Ryan and Kristin Engle, and that alone earns it a certain baseline goodwill. In a fractured moviegoing ecosystem where safe bets and recognizable IP dominate, a harmless, star-driven rom-com can feel like enough, at least on paper. That’s especially true with two appealing leads behind the wheel, Rege-Jean Page and Halle Bailey, both of whom arrive with built-in audiences and undeniable screen presence.

The movie knows exactly who it’s for. This is the cinematic equivalent of a beach read, the kind of glossy escapism people devour on a plane. The familiar ingredients are all present: a beautiful foreign locale, an initially prickly romantic dynamic, a hot and emotionally unavailable love interest, and an aggressive suspension of disbelief. The exterior shots of Tuscany look gorgeous, the people are beautiful, and the story unfolds exactly as expected. The problem is not that “You, Me & Tuscany” sticks to the formula, but that it rarely does anything inventive with it.

Coiro is clearly not aiming for realism. There’s a sitcom-like energy to the whole production, reinforced by interior sets looking as though it were shot largely on a soundstage. That tone might have worked better if the script leaned harder into heightened comedy, but instead it plays everything by the book, even as the plot becomes increasingly ridiculous. Bailey, charming and luminous as ever, plays Anna, a culinary school dropout whose dreams of traveling to Italy and immersing herself in food culture were shaped by her late mother. After her mother dies from cancer, Anna loses her momentum and winds up starting her own housesitting business for the wealthy elites in New York City, going through the motions and quietly mourning a life she never quite started.

Enter Matteo, played by Marco Cavani, whom Anna meet cutes at a bar. In a tidy bit of rom-com convenience, he lives in Tuscany and just happens to be in town on business. He encourages Anna to finally take the Italy trip she and her mother planned. When Anna arrives in Tuscany, it just so happens to coincide with a massive annual festival, the kind that only exists in movies where timing bends effortlessly to serve the plot. You can practically hear the mechanism clicking into place.

Things only get more strained from there. Unable to find a place to stay, Anna sneaks into Matteo’s villa for the night, only to wake up to his family interrogating her. In a panic, she claims to be Matteo’s fiancé. Before there’s even time to process such a bombshell, the entire extended family descends on the villa, eager to meet and welcome her into their orbit. The whole sequence is infused with “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” energy, an association the film leans into even harder thanks to a cameo from Nia Vardalos herself.

This is also where the actual romance begins. Matteo’s brother Michael, played by Page, enters the picture as the rugged, soft-spoken counterpoint to Matteo’s polished charm. Michael is blue-collar, emotionally reserved, and blessed with a jawline that does him no favors in terms of subtlety. He and Anna quickly develop a rapport that the film wants us to read as electric. When she asks him how such a hunk of a man is not married, his reply is pure rom-com shorthand: “Because I always fall for the wrong girl.”

Moments like that reinforce just how rigidly the movie follows the genre playbook. The more you interrogate the story, the shakier it becomes. Anna insists the family not tell Matteo she has arrived unannounced, and apparently no one thinks of texting him. The family also owns a wildly successful restaurant that conveniently becomes the place where Anna reconnects with cooking and, by extension, her mother. Later, the patriarch suffers a head injury on the eve of the festival’s massive finale, leaving Anna as the only person capable of saving the restaurant and leading the charge. She has five hours to create an entirely new menu. References to “The Bear” are made, just in case you are wondering which culinary fantasy universe we are operating in.

Meanwhile, Anna and Michael fall hard and fast. They exchange smitten glances, run through vineyards as sprinklers activate on cue, and kiss passionately against postcard-perfect backdrops. This is all standard issue for the genre, and to Coiro’s credit, she is not pretending this is anything other than a comfort movie. Still, there comes a point when charm alone is not enough. The film keeps asking the audience to accept one convenience after another without ever grounding the characters in anything resembling emotional reality. Eventually, the contrivances pile up to the point where staying invested becomes a chore.

The movie is at its best in the kitchen. Watching food get prepared, plated, and shared carries genuine warmth, and Bailey sells Anna’s rediscovery of purpose more convincingly there than anywhere else. The film also livens up whenever Anna’s friend Claire, played by Aziza Scott, leaves voice messages from New York that act as a running commentary on the absurdity of it all. One voicemail jokingly warns that Anna is headed toward the Italian version of “Get Out,” and it is one of the few moments that acknowledges just how strange this situation actually is.

Ultimately, “You, Me & Tuscany” seems to suggest that lying your way into a family and a sense of belonging is not only acceptable, but oddly empowering. When the cooking stops and the scenery fades into the background, the movie becomes curiously airless. The romance never deepens enough to rise above the contrivances, and too many jokes revolve around how handsome Page is rather than building character or tension. You will know whether this movie is your speed within the first fifteen minutes.

“You, Me & Tuscany” is passable, pleasant, and occasionally diverting. But by the time the credits rolled, I was more than ready to get off the train.

Grade: C

YOU, ME & TUSCANY is now playing in theaters.