Acting is horrible but the writing is even worse and predictable. How did this get even 5.5 stars?

I watched this movie, because I'm a sucker for down and out people finding themselves through new relationships, but I was very disappointed by almost every part of the production. The storyline IS good, but the writing is very predicable and the acting uninspired. The characters were mostly 2-dimensional, with the combative, misunderstood teen, an embarrassingly stereotypical gay couple and a party filled with beautifu and handsomelbackground actors. The only actor who sold me was Avery Sommers as the probation officer. At times I felt like I was watching a college assignment to create a Hallmark movie. But I do have to give them credit for a good try at dramatizing important issues.

As a licensed psychotherapist in Bulgaria who is in no way related to the movie's writer, I found this movie's message to be unbearable. I wanted to like the movie, and the actors did their best to salvage what they could from a terrible script, but good lord. Remove all of the originality and edginess from a Hallmark Channel movie, add an incredibly irritating soundtrack and play the whole thing back at half speed and you have a pretty good idea of what this movie is like.

Apparently I need more lines in this review to meet submission guidelines, so if I had to sum up this movie it would be: "slowly, gently, and repeatedly being punched in the face with mediocrity".