THE Beatles famously sang, "I don't care too much for money/Money can't buy me love."
Clare Kilner's frothy romantic comedy, based on Elizabeth Young's novel Asking For Trouble, suggests the Fab Four might have been wrong - cold hard cash can bring people together.
New York gal about town Kat Ellis (Debra Messing) despairs when she receives an invitation to the wedding of her self-absorbed half-sister Amy (Amy Adams) in London.
The best man, Jeffrey (Jeremy Sheffield), just happens to be Kat's ex-boyfriend and she refuses to turn up for the nuptials without a handsome beau on her arm to prove that she is truly over her old flame.
Unfortunately, without a lover to call her own, Kat resorts to desperate measures.
For $6,000, she hires professional male escort Nick Mercer (Dermot Mulroney) to pose as her boyfriend for the weekend.
Nick turns out to be an expert in human behaviour and he helps her to smoothly navigate the choppy waters of the family get-together.
Sure enough, Jeffrey seems to be driven mad with jealousy at the thought that Kat and Nick are an item.
Moreover, Kat's parents Bunny and Victor (Holland Taylor, Peter Egan) welcome Nick to the family with open arms as a potential son-in-law and every woman at the reception seems to fall under his spell.
Not least Kat's filthy-minded best friend T.J. (Sarah Parish), who ovulates at the mere sight of the dashing New York hunk.
Even Amy's stuffy, floppy-haired fiance Edward Fletcher-Wooten (Jack Davenport) warms to Nick's suave charms.
As the nuptials get under way, Kat realises that her fake relationship with Nick is gradually becoming the real thing.
However, love doesn't come cheap and Cupid has a few surprises in store for Kat and her clan as Amy prepares to waltz up the aisle.
The Wedding Date merrily absorbs elements from Four Weddings and a Funeral, My Best Friend's Wedding and My Big Fat Greek Wedding to contrive a sweet yet slight romantic comedy of errors.
Messing casts aside her neurotic, ditzy persona on Will & Grace to play a lonely and insecure everywoman, desperate to find her Mr Right.
There's not a great deal of pizzazz or energy to her performance, and ultimately it's Mulroney's bon vivant who engineers the happy ending, rather than the plucky heroine.
Parish steals most of the laughs and supporting performances add flecks of colour to proceedings.
The plot unfolds as expected with a subtle twist to romantic comedy convention in the closing minutes, set to a soundtrack of silky Michael Buble ballads.
See it at UCI, ABC
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