If you are looking for a movie to view with a date, recommend seeing the 2006 movie “Bella”, a redemption, family and love story, available on DVD and YouTube.

The movie stars Eduardo Verastegui as Jose, a professional soccer star, on his way to sign a 2-million dollar contract when an accident changes his life and career choice from soccer player to several years latter to chef in his brother Manny’s (Manny Perez) Mexican restaurant in New York City.

Manny fires Nina (Tammy Blanchard), a waitress at the restaurant, for being late for work. Jose quits and comes to the support of Nina, who just discovered she is pregnant and has decided to abort the baby. Jose asks Nina, “Have you thought about adoption?”

Jose decides to adopt Nina’s baby and raise the baby by himself. Jose convinces Nina not to have the abortion and to let him adopt the baby. Several years later Nina meets the child named Bella (Sophie Nyweide) and Jose at the beach, where they exchange gifts.

“Bella” was written, produced and directed by Alejandro Monteverde with Patrick Million and Leo Severino as co-writers and Severino, Verastegui, Denise Pickley and Sean Wolfington as co-producers. “Bella” was the directional debut of Montverde and won the “People’s Choice Award” at the Toronto International Film Festival” and also won the Heartland Film Festival’s Grand Prize Winner for Best Dramatic Feature.

Grade: A

This is another installment of Pronk’s classic film series “Eternally Grateful Great Movies: Reviews of the 2000 Greatest Movies Ever Made.”