Isn’t “voicemail” the least romantic word to appear in a romantic comedy title? It certainly is. But consider this a fair warning. Because while “Voicemail to Isabel” isn’t all that romantic either, it makes a very upbeat effort to prove otherwise. Writer/director Leah McKendrick’s film takes an early stab at it, delivering charmingly matched protagonists and cuter encounters than ever. A young woman grieving the death of her sister keeps leaving confessional voicemails for the deceased woman as a coping mechanism, all the while not realizing that her sister’s phone number has been reassigned to a stranger in another city. Upon hearing their stories, he immediately falls in love.
Like “Sleepless in Seattle,” which contains quite a few boundary violations, this one is a pretty creepy starting point for a story that was meant to end on a happy, wistful sigh. Despite its precision-crafted sweetness, “Voicemails for Isabelle” just can’t get there. This is unfortunate. That’s because Zoey Deutch and Nick Robinson, two believable and likable actors alike in age, genre credentials, and button-up cuteness, do everything they can to make the audience believe. By the time these characters, after the necessary period of separation in the third act, finally forget their past and kiss, you really want to be happy for them. But you can’t completely forget that uneasy voicemail business.
However, if you get distracted by such off-key developments, the film immediately reminds you directly of what other movies it reminds you of. When Wes (Robinson) first told his best friends (Harry Shum Jr. and McKendrick himself) about the phone stalking, they told him harshly, “Tom Hanks is America’s Sweetheart and you’re not Tom Hanks.” (Would even Hanks have gotten away with it? Debatable.) Soon after, lovesick Jill (Deutsch) exclaims that she feels like Meg Ryan. And near the beginning, when her brave sister Isabel (Ciara Bravo) faces a devastating cancer diagnosis, she smiles and says, “This is no ‘walk down memory lane.'”
Indeed, the committed relationship between the sisters is the most believable and affecting element of McKendrick’s screenplay, lending serious emotional weight to the proceedings even after Isabel leaves the scene early. Deutch is left alone to maintain the relationship through Jill’s frequent, long conversations and sad, one-sided messages, a tricky device that the actress makes seem endearingly natural. Jill certainly has a lot to talk about. Now working as a downtrodden commie chef in San Francisco for an abusive and selfish restaurateur (Nick Offerman, deliberately sporting a fake French accent), she’s graduated from culinary school and has had some bad dates, especially with her conniving colleague Arthur (Lucas Gage) and conniving podcaster Tyler (Toby Sandeman). If career, love, and ego are all on Fritz, if only someone could hear her outlet.
Except someone can. Wes, a similarly heartbroken Austin real estate agent, initially listens to her redirected messages as an amusing curiosity, but eventually finds himself drawn into her plight. Immediately, he searched for her on Instagram and booked a flight to San Francisco so they could artificially stage a natural encounter. We succeeded in charming her, if not us. Robinson (“Love, Simon”) has a puppy-dog charm and makes the switch to full effect here, but it doesn’t soften Wes’s eccentrically dominant behavior and instead just makes it seem crazier.
As expected, you’ll definitely buy the hurtful aftermath when Jill stumbles upon the truth behind her romantic stroke of luck. (Where would this genre be in the 21st century without cell phone ringtones?) The idea of anything coming back from it is much more difficult. Still, this star pairing shines just enough to make you wish things had been different. Deutch, who directed the first truly viral Netflix rom-com with 2018’s “Set It Up,” has enough candid honesty as a performer to counter Jill’s eccentricities. Robinson matches her sparkling yet annoying energy beat by beat.
McKendrick directs with smooth, brisk mastery, despite the film’s all-too-frequent and all-too-obvious needle drops. Taylor Swift’s “Marjorie,” with its refrain “What’s dead doesn’t stay dead,” is applied to some seriously on-the-nose effects, a welcome improvement over Benson Boone’s “Beautiful Things,” but it just brings a certain algorithmic quality to the package. Still, there’s not a movie without moments of truth in which its characters repeatedly, energetically, endearingly slump to the tune of Robin’s “Dancing on My Own.”
