Some sequels are never meant to happen. They trivialize the original. I watched and enjoyed The Note (2007, Hallmark Channel) with Genie Francis as Peyton McGruder and Ted McGinley as Kingston Danville in the lead roles. And as chick flicks go, I could have easily written the script and endings for a solid sequel. Unfortunately, I didn't write. I watched the sequel, Taking A Chance On Love.
In The Note, the scope went beyond the standard chick flick genre to include a broader message of forgiveness. The movie tracked smoothly. Peyton desperately searched to heal her own emotional wounds with the forgiveness promised in a letter she found washed ashore from an ocean crashed plane. This was a mellow movie worth the view. The Note II - Take a Chance on Love was so disconnected that if I had not taken an assignment to review it, I would have given up and clicked elsewhere after the first 15 minutes.
In this sequel, Peyton is challenged in a letter from a reader to defend her belief expressed in her Heart Healer column that "passion should be tempered with caution". After her curiosity and personal agenda compel her to contact the letter writer, the storyline becomes a jumbled skipping back and forth between parenting and romantic issues. Viewers endured flashbacks to the '60s to witness the letter writer's tale of a love lost to practicality. At that point, every viewer should have been able to predict with a certainty that by the end of the movie the estranged couple would…. well, just say I won't spoil the ending for you in case you haven't seen the beginning.
Especially for a chick flick, The Note II is very flat and lacks the flash to at least inspire the rolled eyes reaction to the predictable happy endings of mediocre chick flicks. However, although very clumsily done, I was entertained by a number of relationship issues that The Note II exposed.
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