Critic Reviews

At Midnight is a rom-com that loves the hell out of rom-coms, and rightly so — the genre’s at its best when it’s not trying to be clever or smart or better than those that came before it, when it fully embraces the warm, fuzzy feeling that comes with watching two people fall in love, and Feingold’s script knows it.

As movie star Sophie Wilder, Monica Barbaro is effortlessly charming, while Diego Boneta imbues assistant hotel manager Alejandro with equal amounts of charisma. 10 times better than audiences will expect, At Midnight is worth a watch.

Thanks to its two young stars, At Midnight shines just bright enough to keep us watching, and sometimes that’s all we really want.

Boneta and Barbaro’s chemistry adds a simmering, sultry sway to the material’s rhythms, gifting it with an uplifting buoyancy. They’re magnetic together, driving our rooting interest for the couple.

At Midnight is caught between its reverence for what came before and the relevance of figuring out where it's going next. If that feels just a little too on-the-nose for a modern rom-com, well, maybe it's a good thing this one didn't cost the price of a movie ticket, after all.

At Midnight has a certain Old Hollywood flair that gives it a unique edge, but its surface-level approach makes the romance more frothy than impactful.

Targeted as Valentine’s Day comfort cinema, the new Paramount+ movie At Midnight is as sappy and predictable as it sounds, with walks along the beach, romantic getaways, candy-colored scenery and, of course, the inevitable mix-ups, misunderstandings and silly arguments that are requirements of the rom-com genre.

Barbaro and Boneta’s charm offensive never amounts to much, though. The eagerness this film has to please could never match how pleased Feingold clearly is to be making a movie like it.

The problem with At Midnight isn’t the gorgeous scenery or the casual believability of the sparks between Boneta and Barbaro. It’s the production quality — mostly that there is none. Episodes of “Bachelor in Paradise” have better cinematography than this Paramount+ feature, making the streamer seem incapable of competently funding anything that isn’t produced by Taylor Sheridan.

At Midnight is the mildest R-rated rom-com on record, a tame and tepid affair pairing up a couple of career supporting players as the leads, with mild-mannered laughs, lukewarm love scenes and conventional wish-fulfillment-fantasy plot points.