Monthly Archives: November 2013

The Christmas Train

Hollywood movie director Max Powers (Danny Glover) is taking a four day long train trip toward Los Angeles along with his trusty assistant Eleanor (Kimberly Williams-Paisley), who he’s been encouraging to finally write a script of her own instead of always doctoring someone else’s, and what better inspiration than an old-timey mode of transportation full of characters just begging to be over-written.

Also on the train: Tom (Dermot Mulroney), a former war correspondent turned lifestyle journalist, a young couple looking to marry on the train despite his parents’ disapproval, a lonely older man, a thief, a chess snob, oh, and a zany woman named Agnes (Joan Cusack) who seems to be in everybody else’s business. Oh and lots of people besides of course, and our two writers mine them for all they’re worth, but wait! The writers are actually of interest themselves. Turns out, they’re former flames. Some have said they were each other’s true loves. And maybe things are sliding back in that direction – or they were until Tom’s fiancée boards the train about halfway through. Drama!!!

Of course, the Hallmark gods are smiling down on the train so the romance WILL BE nurtured, even if a snowstorm has to strand the train on the tracks until true love is confessed.

The Christmas Train is perhaps a smidge more tolerable than the usual schmaltz, so I’m thankful for that, and any reason to see Dermot Mulroney’s dimples is a good one.

Hometown Christmas

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Noelle (Beverley Mitchell) is back in Louisiana for good, with a medical degree to practice alongside her father. To honour the occasion, Noelle decides to revive one of her late mother’s most loved traditions, the town’s live nativity. In fact, the log-line of the film calls it the “resurrection of the nativity” which seems like an unfortunate choice of words. I’m picturing a Franken-Jesus, but I guess that’s Easter.

Anyway, things go swimmingly for about ten seconds before Noelle finds out that her dad has her new girlfriend, and the new girlfriend (Melissa Gilbert!) is the mother of Noelle’s old boyfriend – who, incidentally, is also back in town after an injury derailed his baseball career. Noelle’s still smarting from their senior year break up but that was a decade ago and the magic of Christmas (or at least her horny dad) is making sure they spend a lot of time together lately.

Is the angel Gabriel really the MVP of heaven? What exactly is a southern snowman? Do matching pajamas make you smug or just smarmy? Will they be able to turn a barn into a stable in time? How many Little House on the Prairie references does a Hallmark Christmas romance need? Does a living nativity really need a pig AND a camel? And will this small town have enough marshmallows for both sweet potato pies AND hot cocoa????

The answers will surprise you. Make a date with Hallmark to find out.

Christmas Everlasting

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Lucy (Tatyana Ali), like 80% of Hallmark holiday movie characters, is a big city lawyer working long hours on the junior partner track. But all that comes to a screeching halt when a phone call from her uncle Barney (Dennis Haysbert) reveals that her big sister Alice has unexpected passed away.

Lucy and Alice were quite close as kids but guilt over an accident that derailed Alice’s golden life and left her with special needs has kept Lucy away. Returning home to Wisconsin, however, dispels the myth that Alice has led a small life. The whole town seems to be grieving along with Lucy, everyone eager to share some special way that Alice touched their lives. Moving back into their childhood home, Lucy is reminded that she no longer knew her sister as she once did. Alice led a full if slightly eccentric life, leaving behind excellent of proof of such when her will stipulates that for Lucy to inherit the house, she must first live there for 4 weeks – which just happen to be over the holidays.

In a coincidence only Hallmark would have the balls to suggest, Lucy’s high school sweetheart Peter (Dondré Whitfield) is acting as Alice’s attorney, but as a small town lawyer, he’s an excellent example of working to live, not living to work.

Will Lucy risk her career to inherit a house she doesn’t even want? Will she ever make friends with Alice’s snobby cat? And what the heck is up with the piles of quilts for the mysterious Maeve all over the house? Check out Christmas Everlasting, starring the Fresh Prince’s little sister, Mr. Allstate insurance, and honest to god Ms. Patti Labelle if you’d like to find out – and honestly, how can you resist?

Christmas in Evergreen, Letters to Santa

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Are you a fan the Hallmark Evergreen universe? Officially, there was just Christmas in Evergreen, but I guess the Hallmark crew couldn’t wait to go back (it’s actually Vancouver) so they threw some fake snow on the ground and came up with a “spin-off” (very loosely) set in the same quaint town you fell in love with in the first film (although, don’t worry if you never saw it, it literally has nothing to do with this one).

In this one, Lisa (Jill Wagner) finally makes good on her bucket list and takes a Christmas time trip to her hometown, Evergreen! Things have changed since she was last there. The general store has closed, and…well that’s the main thing. It inspires Lisa to put her vague skills to use restoring the to its former charm so that someone may buy it. Good thing she keeps running into hunky jack of all trades Kevin (Mark Deklin) who, despite only being in town for a week, has for some reason found various employments and accepts yet another, as Lisa’s contractor. Anyway, they find the “Mailbox to Santa” in the dusty shop; it used to be beloved for granting Christmas wishes. They convince the bakery across the street, Kringle Kitchen, to babysit it alongside their own wish-granting snow globe while the store’s under renovation. But huzzah! They find a 25 year old undelivered letter in the box and now the whole town of Evergreen rallies around it to grant one last wish.

Also there’s a subplot about a key.

Is it a super great movie? Of course not. But you love Evergreen, I love Evergreen, there’s an old Chevy truck that’s pretty great, and the star of the first film, Hallmark legend Ashley Williams, who starred in the first, and apparently her character is still there, still living her happily ever after, so why can’t Lisa and Kevin?

Goofs in The Grudge

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Does spotting goofs help you get through a scary movie? By popular demand, here’s a short list of what you can watch for in The Grudge to help you cope with a very scary movie:

The message Susan leaves on the answering machine is a little bit different when Karen first hears it than when the detectives hear it again later in the movie, and when we actually see Susan leaving it. Listen carefully – it’s never quite the same!
When Karen is in the shower, after the hand comes out of her head, she spins around in the shower real quick and you can see that she’s not naked, she’s weirdly showering in a black tube top.
When Karen’s searching the net, the fake-Google she’s using is rife with spelling errors. Some poor intern set that up a little too quickly!
When Karen first goes to Emma’s home, she opens the door, then the camera pans over wrappers and crap on the floor. Then it cuts to an overhead shot, and all the garbage has moved around magically!
When Susan leaves her apartment when Matthew rings the bell, the door slams shut behind her. When she turns around to go back in, the door is open. This happens all the time in movies. The sets are so flimsy, you see someone slam the door behind them, but instead of clicking into place it actually bounces back. They’ll stick in a convincing door-slam noise, but they have to cut away quickly or you’d see it swing way open.
In the first scene with Yoko, you can clearly see a crew member in the background. You get a glimpse of them again as a reflection in the banister when Susan enters the stairwell.
At the end, before Karen enters the morgue, she has a lot of blood and bruises in her face. Seconds later, inside the room, she appears with less blood than before, especially on the right side of her face. They must have called a lunch break in between shots, or else Karen’s got some mystical healing powers she didn’t tell us about.

See? You can do this thing!

Christmas Wishes and Mistletoe Kisses

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Abbey (Jill Wagner) is a single mother trying to jump start her career as an interior designer after taking time off to raise her son Max (Wyatt Hunt). Luckily she’s got an excellent contact at the retirement residence where she volunteers – Caroline (Ms. Donna Mills, the one and only) recommends her for a big “estate” gig converting a lavish home into offices fit to host a holiday party on Christmas Eve. Businessman Nick (Matthew Davis) isn’t exactly immediately impressed but then again, his first impression was actually the day before when they literally ran into each other on the street, which is the cause of 80% of all romances, according to Hallmark. Coffee spillage optional but I’d say papers at minimum.

Anyway, an old man at the home is trying to fix Abbey up with a handsome, sweet doctor who likes kids while Caroline is trying to push her and Nick together, but Nick’s senior vice president might come between them if Nick’s obsession with work doesn’t do them in before they even get started. There are antiques to consider, cocoa to drink, gingerbread houses to build, trees to decorate, and actual halls to literally deck.

Oh to have two perfect men fighting over you at Christmas, befriending your dad, ready to adopt your son, adoring of your subpar work. All the best guys are either gay or on Hallmark.

Welcome to Christmas

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Madison Lane is a very busy resort developer tasked with finding a location for a new ski resort. She’s pretty committed to Mountain Park as the next location but her boss wants her to check out the town of Christmas, Colorado all the same. Christmas has been down on its luck for a while now, in desperate need of both jobs and tourists if it wants to flourish once again and though it is small, it put together a pretty attractive incentive package for the resort people. On her way there, Madison (Jennifer Finnigan) literally crashes into the Welcome to Christmas sign, which will serve as a running joke and an opportunity to rethink the town’s awful slogan. It also conveniently traps her there or as long as the mechanic can convince her he doesn’t have the parts to make her car run.

Meanwhile, the whole town launches a campaign tailored in secret to Madison to convince her theirs is the best town for the new ski resort. Town Sheriff Gage McBride (Eric Mabius) acts as her guide while the town throws every magical thing they can think at her: tree lighting ceremonies and ornament scavenger hunts, not to mention oodles of charm and tradition. Madison can’t help but fall in love with the town. And with the sheriff. Right?

Chateau Christmas

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World famous pianist Margot (Merritt Patterson) takes a break from her busy touring schedule to stay at Chateau Neuhaus for Christmas. It’s a family tradition she hasn’t had time to share for several years, and while she’s happy to reconnect with her young niece, she’s also hiding out from a recent review that called her playing passionless – the worst part is, she knows it’s true. Contemplating retirement, she’s glad for the time off. Not that she’s going to get much.

Also at the Chateau for Christmas: her ex-boyfriend Jackson (Luke Macfarlane)! Seems like a pretty big coincidence, but his best friend is the hotel manager, and the manager has a pretty big problem: their annual Christmas concert is in peril, having lost not only its director but most of its performers as well. Uh oh. So obliging Jackson got roped into putting together an entire concert in just a few days with his ex-in-laws in attendance and his beautiful ex-girlfriend set to be its star. Life is throwing them together again after their careers took them in different directions – will Margot and Jackson be able to find their way back to each other?

Hallmark Magic 8 Ball says: all signs point to yes. Happy endings are guaranteed, remember? And happiness defined by Hallmark means true love forever. That’s sort of a pukey concept, but if you’re willing to buy in to the romance be all and end all of that is good and right in the world, you can rest assured that Hallmark will come through for you. The true purpose of a Hallmark movie is to get just as swept along as the couple in question. You will give in to the Christmas spirit, which inevitably fosters love and warmth and family and commitment and cookies.

On the 12th Date of Christmas

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As fate would have it, Jennifer and Aidan both work at the same Chicago scavenger hunt company. Yes, a company that plans and executes scavenger hunts on behalf of anyone crazy enough to pay them – typically as corporate team-building things, which is a sad and terrible market around which to build a business. Not only do Jennifer (Mallory Jansen) and Aidan (Tyler Hynes) both work at the same place, they’re vying for the same promotion. Aidan has more experience, but Jennifer has a certain creative spark, which does not go unnoticed by their new client who is relaunching one of the city’s swankiest hotels. This means that these two rivals, one a Christmas fiend, the other a self-described lone wolf, will have to work together on the firm’s biggest project to date.

The theme is the 12 Days of Christmas, but their inspiration leans more toward the romantic – the 12 Dates then. And for some reason instead of just thinking of clues in their heads or brain-storming at the office, they decide the only thing that makes sense is to hit the town and do the dates themselves. Strictly as professionals of course, just a couple of colleagues who realize that incorporating their date selfies into the pitch is a needless but brilliant way to expense wine tasting on company time. Who could have guessed that going on a bunch of romantic dates together could make you fall in love?

Script writers Christine Conradt and Jamie Pachino take the time to set each clue in a unique location of Chicago, all twelve in different historic districts so the scavenger hunters will have the opportunity to enjoy the whole city before eventually being led to the luxury hotel’s grand opening in its ballroom, all decked out for Christmas (where, incidentally, Jennifer and Aidan’s boss also awaits to announce the promotion). Unfortunately, the siren song of tax breaks and nearly year-round snow cried out to director Gary Yates, who filmed the thing in Winnipeg, Manitoba. So if Chicago looks good to you, fly to Canada instead.

Christmas with a Prince

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Pediatric doctor Tasha Mason (Kaitlyn Leeb) is very dedicated to the little patients on her ward, so she’s quite put out when a wealthy playboy displaces some of the kids to make room for his own private convalescence after a ski accident leaves him with a broken leg. Imagine her surprise when the wealthy mystery patient turns out to be none other than her childhood boarding school crush, Prince Alexander (Nick Hounslow).

Dr. Mason’s little brother Jeff (Josh Dean) also works on the ward as a nurse, and he and Prince Alexander have always been close, particularly so in the last year after the death of Alexander’s brother, leaving him the sole heir to his kingdom (currently ruled by his disapproving father, played by Charles Shaunghnessy). Jeff is the uneasy monkey in the middle, but soon Prince Alexander is winning over the kids as well – and not just by throwing money around, but by playing and engaging with them. Think Tasha can resist? Not for long, that’s for sure.

But when Tasha tries to step into his world, she suffers a lot of pushback – the King isn’t thrilled, but a conniving Russian princess who’d like to land Alexander for herself even less so. But Dr. Tasha isn’t a pushover, or a quitter. And there’s no better proof than a sequel, which fans can watch at their leisure, possibly even back to back!