As Netflix has turned its hand to mass-producing romantic comedies, there have been some truly delightful successes — movies that capture the sweetness, humor, brightness and sizzle of a ‘90s or ‘00s classic (“Always Be My Maybe,” “Set It Up,” and “Wedding Season” are among our favorites). But many of the platform’s romcoms are aiming more for the Hallmark Channel audience than the cinematic release one, and of those, the movies tend to fall into two categories: oddly melancholy, and intensely zany. It’s “A California Christmas” (mopey, muted colors, plot points revolve around someone dying of cancer) or “Love Hard” (pratfall-heavy, bright colors, plot points revolve around a kiwi allergy making someone’s face look puffy).
This week, entirely by accident, we ended up watching one of each. We chose to pair “Love in the Villa” with “That’s Amor” because they both featured sad American women healing from rejection by exploring a new culture and finding love with hot European men. As it tu…
