★★½ (2½ out of 4)
Zoey Deutch performs far beyond the demands of romcom duty in “Voicemails for Isabelle,” a Netflix movie that finds its heart away from the usual sappy clichés. Deutch plays Jill, a wannabe pastry chef who has lost the love of her life. That would be her younger sister Isabelle (Ciara Bravo), a sassy fireball confined to her bed with a terminal case of cystic fibrosis. Since the Texas sisters, who live in Austin, are now separated while Jill interns at a high-end restaurant in San Francisco, Jill sends voicemails to Isabelle whenever she thinks of her, which is all the time. And, boy, do these two laugh.
The catch is that when Isabelle dies, while Jill is away, the resilient chef refuses to stop sending Isabelle voicemails. It’s her way of coping with grief. She sees no harm in it or in replaying old messages from her sister, which are consistently hilarious. Isabelle was not one to wallow in self pity.
The movie itself does not share that virtue. Written and directed by Leah McKendrick, ”Voicemails for Isabelle” knows how to play tearjerking like a fiddle. Things pick up when Isabelle’s number is reassigned to a hotshot Austin realtor named Wes (prettyboy Nick Robinson). Not only does Wes eavesdrop on Jill’s happy-sad messages, he falls in love with her, voice alone. He also never tells Jill what he’s doing. Instead, he finagles a trip to the city where Tony Bennett left his heart and pursues her.
'Voicemails' lays on the sugar bun slush so thick I cringed, but Zoey Deutch is irresistible.
This is when I felt “Voicemails for Isabelle” had the potential to turn Wes into a murderous stalker. Shows you where my mind goes. Is it just me or does his behavior sound really creepy? Instead, McKendrick digs down into the sugary muck. Her plot borrows shamelessly from “You Got Mail” and “Sleepless in Seattle” and every other 1990s romcom inspired by the Meg Ryan/Tom Hanks chemistry that made two lovers of strangers.
You’re no Tom Hanks,” says a friend, stating the obvious to Wes. That friend is Breeda, played quite amusingly by McKendrick herself. Breeda and her fiancé, Andy (Harry Shum Jr.), act as the warning chorus to tell Wes to tell Jill the truth and DO IT NOW.
If that happened, of course, there’d be no movie. And to be truthful, I have to say that there are times when “Voicemails for Isabella” finds a charming vibe that is damn near irresistible. For that give major props to Deutch, the daughter of “Back to the Future” star Lea Thompson and director Howard Deutch, who both know there way around a comic line that Zoey has clearly inherited.
Deutch never finds the chemistry with Robinson that Jill did with her late sister. And there are times when McKendrick lays on the sugar bun slush so thick I cringed. I hit my limit when Wes started leaving his own voicemails for dead Isabelle. Deranged as well as creepy—that’s too much! As is the way McKendrick keeps laying on vocals from “Dancing on My Own,” the signature sad banger from Swedish pop star Robyn.
I kept thinking how better the movie would be if Jill earned some fem cred by blowing off Wes and flying solo. But again, that’s just me again, dancing on my own while “Voices for Isabelle” is killing it on Netflix. You decide.