Peter Bradshaw 

Your Fault review – bizarre and wooden step-sibling romance

Sequel to unaccountably popular Amazon Prime hit finds the same oldsters still out to stop the forbidden young lovers necking in glamorous locations
  
  

Makes a daytime TV soap look like Ingmar Bergman … Your Fault.
Makes a daytime TV soap look like Ingmar Bergman … Your Fault. Photograph: Pablo Ricciardulli/Prime

This mind-pulverisingly bizarre and woodenly acted romdram from Spain is the second of a projected trilogy (My Fault, Your Fault, Our Fault) and a whopping ratings success for Amazon’s Prime Video despite, or because of, the fact that it makes a daytime TV soap look like Ingmar Bergman. It is based on the bestselling (and initially self-published) romance series by Argentinian author Mercedes Ron, with a premise that has maybe been borrowed from Amy Heckerling’s 90s comedy classic Clueless, yet with all the humour scoured away: forbidden step-sibling romance.

Noah (Nicole Wallace) is the teen daughter of a widow who has remarried a wealthy lawyer and to the dismay of these (hypocritical) elders and betters, pouting Noah falls hard for the smoulderingly hunky new stepbrother she has now acquired; this is Nick, breathily known to her as Neeeeeeeck!, as he attends to her physical needs in various upscale locations. The oldsters were forever trying to split them up in the first film and they are now at it again, brazenly setting up Neeeeeeeck! in his dad’s law firm in the hope he will fall for the sultry intern Sofia (Gabriela Andrada).

Meanwhile, Noah’s freshman college roommate Briar (Álex Béjar) has a secret emotional history with Neeeeeeeck! and Noah herself has a highly unlikely interest in illegal drag-racing – because of her criminally inclined late father who has a connection with some badass types from the non-rich but still attractive part of town. It all could have been fun with a teaspoonful of humour, but everyone concerned behind the camera has calculated (perhaps correctly) that this would be inimical to its commercial success.

• Your Fault is on Prime Video from 27 December.

 

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