Better Than Chocolate

A terrifically entertaining romantic comedy, Better Than Chocolate tackles the age-old theme of the universal need for love with exuberance and gusto. Read full review

Better Than Chocolate is smart, funny adult entertainment -- the sex scenes are bold and convincing -- with a love story that is touching and surprisingly cheerful. Read full review

A semisweet nugget, an insinuating, low-budget little charmer. [27 Aug 1999, p.E4]

Perhaps the best thing about Better Than Chocolate is that it works as a comedy of characters, not of morals. If there's such a thing as a screwball same-sex comedy, this is it. [10 Sep 1999]

Winning performances and bright writing enliven Better Than Chocolate. [20 Sep 1999, p.D5]

For all the real problems faced by its characters, Better Than Chocolate is finally a comic rhapsody to romantic love, the possibility of happily ever after within an all-accepting subculture. Read full review

There's a playful exuberance on display in Better Than Chocolate, a bright, funny and sexy romp set in the heart of Vancouver's vibrant lesbian community. Although it has a little trouble deciding what it wants to be when it grows up - romantic comedy or full-throttle farce - the picture's tonal ambiguity also happens to be part of its unpredictable charm. [12 Aug 1999]

Even though you could wish that Better Than Chocolate was a little more substantially developed, it nonetheless brims over with good humor and high spirits and has some moments of stunning yet tasteful eroticism. [13 Aug 1999, p.F10]

Despite its familiar trappings, Better Than Chocolate turns out to be quite enjoyable, thanks to some very engaging acting, a few involving subplots and an energy that must be credited to director Anne Wheeler. [27 Aug 1999, p.I]

An upbeat-if-shapeless Canadian comedy about two adorable young women, an artist and an aspiring writer, who fall in love at first sight. [26 Jul 1999, p.C06]

Better Than Chocolate is essentially a 101-minute sitcom that runs out of energy (but not vulgarity) long before it reaches its predictable finale. [27 Aug 1999]

A semi-sweet but not all-that-satisfying Canadian import, set around a lesbian-run bookstore. [17 Sep 1999, p.E3]

For all its flaws, Better Than Chocolate is a fair enough entertainment value -- certainly no less meritorious overall than, say, Runaway Bride. But, like many other films that have boasted both a high likability quotient and a positive social message, it seems to be getting a bit more credit than it really deserves. And as far as I'm concerned it's no favor to allow a filmmaker of Anne Wheeler's obvious gifts to operate so far below peak efficiency. Read full review

Wheeler is extremely secure in filming the sex scenes - they are inarguably erotic - but she has trouble with serious drama. Overall, that makes Better Than Chocolate a mixed bag with a wavering focus. In many ways, it's like the majority of heterosexual romances -- not unpleasant or unwatchable, but nothing special. Read full review

You'd think indie filmmakers would have learned by now that people tend to put on a sober face when addressed from the pulpit. Read full review

Better Than Chocolate is well-filmed and for the most part well-acted. But its technical professionalism only serves to make the amateurishly crude patches of Maggie Thompson's script more obvious. [13 Aug 1999, p.062]

The problems of coming out, intolerance, safe sex, and censorship are ticked off like a checklist in Better Than Chocolate, a well-meaning Canadian slice-of-life comedy that remains firmly planted in the creative rut currently plaguing gay cinema. Read full review

The not-so-incredible story of two girls in love. Read full review