Cate (Jodie Sweetin) took over as CEO of the Merry & Bright candy cane company from her grandmother, and she’s struggling to make it her own. She knows she needs to make some changes to stay competitive but she doesn’t want to disrupt her grandmother’s vision or traditions. Meanwhile, Cate’s mother is more concerned with getting her coupled up, and has set her up with a whole bunch of unpromising dates. Gabe (Andrew Walker) doesn’t seem all that different at first, not any more promising, when she meets him a week before Christmas, but he is, mostly because he’s actually not there to date her, he’s been sent by corporate recovery to assess her company and make recommendations. Oops, that’s awkward. He is single, though…
Predictably, these two will fall in love as they make plans to expand her business and diversify her candy line. But is it really love if it’s based on business? And is it good for business if it veers away from candy canes? And why is her mother (Sharon Lawrence) always carrying around that duffel bag, anyway?
Each year about 1.76 billion candy canes are made and 90% of candy canes are sold between Thanksgiving and Christmas, though National Candy Cane day is actually on December 26, so be sure to save some for then. Are you a candy cane consumer? Do you hang them on your tree? Are you a traditionalist as far as flavour or would you be up for some of Cate’s new flavours? Cinnamon, key lime pie, gingerbread, eggnog, pumpkin spice perhaps? The strangest I’ve seen (and sent) is bacon, but according to the internet, you can get clam canes with a pretty silver stripe, mac and cheese candy canes with a potent after taste, pickle ones, and even ketchup. Kind of makes peppermint seem quaint, doesn’t it?
Anyway, Merry & Bright is a standard Hallmark offering with a better than average dog actor, whose acting is so good that he had my Walt barking right back, and you know I’ll always have a soft spot for a cute and scruffy pup.
Vivienne (Jessy Schram) is a busy television producer in the middle of putting on this year’s Christmas show. The opening act just happens to be a client of old friend, Gavin (Wes Brown), which may be a source of friction since they parted with hurt feelings on either side, each feeling rebuffed. But they’re adults, right? And professionals. They can do this.
Except just when Vivienne thinks she’s doing a good job, her boss shows up to tell her she’s not. Not her actual boss, who tells her she’s up for a promotion, but her dead boss (Wynonna Judd), who tells her her life is on a surprisingly dark path. Vivienne’s about to be visited by the Ghost of Christmas Past (Kix Brooks) and the Ghost of Christmas Present (Kimberly Williams-Paisley) to show her what happens when you put ambition ahead of friendship. And maybe romance?
Sara Evans and Raelynn perform to give A Nashville Christmas Carol an authentic country flavour. The Dickens aspect is obviously a bit played out, but what the heck, it’s Nashville, and we’ve never seen the popular Christmas Carol story with these accents before. Probably.
Is it a great movie? No it is not. But you will not see a more gorgeous gown on the Hallmark channel this season than the one that Williams-Paisley wears in her ghostly apparition. And not only is it a nice message to put friendship first, it’s also an excellent reminder that the best relationships started out with solid friendship foundations.
Joseph (Josh Swickard) has a lot to prove working for his mother’s company, and he’s determined once and for all that he’s worthy of the job. He’s sent out to a ranch down on its luck to convince the family to sell before Christmas. Joseph is convinced this will be an in and out job, but boy was he wrong.
For some reason, he ends up posing as ranch hand “Manny” and believes that working alongside owner Callie (Lauren Swickard) and getting to know her will provide invaluable insider knowledge so he’ll know exactly what buttons to push to get her to agree (when he eventually reveals himself, one supposes). This actually requires a man with soft hands to work on a dairy farm for some time, which isn’t exactly Joseph’s forte. Luckily he’s got his driver Leo (Ali Afshar) stashed nearby, and Leo’s rooming with the real Manny (David Del Rio), who can be coaxed with cash to provide insight into the job and even he wardrobe.
Laura Swickard wrote A California Christmas, and stars in it with her real-life husband. She wrote a thirst trap for her own husband (who starts removing his shirt well before the ranch work commences). Do they have chemistry? Sure. Nothing crazy, but they’re watchable together. Less watchable: Gunnar Anderson, who is mis-cast as the film’s antagonist. It’s hard to take a man with curly hair seriously as a cattle hand, let alone as a villain – no matter how oversized the tires on his truck are, and believe me, he’s compensating for something MAJOR with the size of those babies.
Callie’s got a sick mother, a dead father, and a tragic backstory; Swickard has really written herself a juicy part, but while she thinks it’s a beautiful piece of tenderloin, it’s actually a hamburger steak, and there’s not enough gravy in the world to convince me otherwise.
This movie is trying to disguise itself as a romantic Christmas movie, and while it does okay in the romance department, it’s a complete failure holiday-wise. However, once the setting was established as Petaluma, I knew that the movie was really neither – it was really part of the Petaluma conspiracy that seems to be even vaster than I’d imagined. A lot of films coming out of Petaluma these days are very thinly veiled ranching propaganda.
Altogether, this is a pretty forgettable movie, and if you’re in the mood for something sweet and Christmassy, you’re better off over at Hallmark.
Kate (Lucia Micarelli), a talented violinist, has injured her hand and gone home to stay with her parents while it heals. It turns out her physical therapist is Patrick (Michael Rady), a childhood friend she hasn’t seen in years. I bet you can already tell what fate’s in store these two, though there are some challenges so as not to make it TOO easy for these two lovebugs to reconnect. Kate, of course, will be off touring the world again if her fingers heal correctly, and Patrick’s likely to be lending his services somewhere in Africa if he lands his dream job.
But for now, let’s just concentrate on fulfilling Patrick’s little cousin’s Christmas wish list, filled with such unintentionally therapeutic activities like wreath making and gingerbread building. Then there’s the problem of Grandpa Joe (James Saito) who hasn’t enjoyed the family music store since his wife died. Getting him involved again just might lead to the reinstatement of their once-famous family Christmas parties.
This is sounding a bit like a lackluster movie I realize, when in actually, it was kind of charming. Lucia Micarelli, in particular, is a joy to watch, herself an actual accomplished violin and piano player. She has a nice, easy chemistry with Rady, and they make it easy to root for them. Plus the script has a couple of actual funny moments, and a more grown up, less idealized version of romance that feels like a mature and quite palatable Hallmark holiday treat.
Clem Marshwell (Clarke Peters) is celebrating his 30th year at the Startop Christmas tree lot – and sadly, also his last. He’s finding it physically challenging as he gets older, and it’s not the same since his beloved wife died, but the truth is, he still loves it and is loathe to give it up, but developers are swooping in to take over the lot, and the decision’s been made for him. For now, though, he’s practically a Chicago celebrity, longtime clients returning year after year, and Clem remembers them all. Julie (Autumn Reeser) and young son Matt (Anthony Bolognese) are chief among them. Longtime friends, Christmas is a special time for them to reconnect and it’s been an especially hard year for them as Julie’s father passed after a long illness, devastating Matt, and leaving Julie with an illegitimate medical debt she can’t get rid of.
Enter Nick (Jesse Metcalfe), who’s just been fired from his job in finance, in which an alarming amount of his identity was wrapped up. Clem randomly notices him walking by the Christmas tree lot and offers him a job because he’s tall (not: taller than Clem, maybe, but tall? Sean is offended. And Metcalfe is 5’10) even though his blazer doesn’t scream manual labour and his Porsche probably isn’t fit to make tree deliveries. But not only is he “tall” he’s a great love interest for Julie, especially because of his attempts to bond with Matt, who’s been quiet ever since his grandpa died. They each have the ability to transform each other’s lives this tree selling season, at least until the obligatory (and in this case, even more meaningless than most) misunderstanding sets them back.
I seem to have enjoyed Christmas Under The Stars more than your typical Hallmark holiday film, and Peters and Reeser are the two biggest reasons why. It turns out, authentic acting does go a long way no matter how cheesy the material is. And either the material was slightly less cheesy (lactose free cheese?) or the acting was good enough that the cheese went down smooth (like après-ski fondu). Okay, I love cheese, so sue me.
And I rarely do this, but shout out to hair stylist Terry Hanson and makeup artist Charles Porlier who kept your girl Autumn looking flawless every damn minute, which can be difficult to do on a cold “Chicago” (Vancouver) set. Julie is a single mother and school teacher who’s biggest social engagement is her chronic addiction to a Christmas tree lot, not exactly glamourous, but while keeping her natural, she’s giving me major hair envy and Porlier knows the secret to a perfect berry lip (hmu!). I always admire a Hallmark costume designer (in this case, Jaralin Detienne) because they must comb stores year-round to amass those perfect holiday sweaters – the opposite of an ugly sweater, a Hallmark leading lady sweater should be soft, snug, cozy, feminine, conservative but with a memorable detail, like a ruffle at the sleeve, or a bow at the back, or some pearls scattered along the neckline. I kind of want to live in the Hallmark wardrobe department among all these perfect sweaters in their array of wintry colours (you’ll never see hot pink on the Hallmark channel) and all of their perfect red coats, with perfect cashmere accessories that always match, because part of the fantasy of Hallmark is that you never leave your mittens in a cab.
It’s easy to get stuck on the Hallmark formula, but the machine includes so much more than just the predictable story. It means casting girl-next-door leads (pretty, approachable, age 30 and up), finding an army of small towns that can be tarted up for Christmas, scouting inns and lodges (Bret Jolliffe) with authentic details like snow-capped dormer windows, or wood-carved benches by a skating pond, and set decorating (Sheldon Feyter) the hell out of every inch of available surface. It’s a fantasy that works because it’s recognizably real life, but elevated for that extra holiday heart. And with so many dedicated people working so hard to make this movie drip with the Christmas spirit, the least we can do is take a moment to appreciate it.
When your wedding planner quits just days before your Christmas Eve wedding, most couples would freak out, but most couples aren’t Liam and Katie. Liam’s mother Joan (Catherine Bell) is a florist on the verge of making the jump to wedding planner herself. Don’t worry, guys, she’s got this.
Liam (Luke Bilyk) and Katie (Sage Kitchen) are getting married at the Snowfall Lodge, where both of their families enjoyed childhood holidays. In fact, it’s where Joan met her husband, and it’s the perfect place to honour his memory now that he’s gone. The bride’s family hasn’t been able to fly in yet (pesky Christmas weather!), but luckily Katie’s often-absent uncle Beau (Mark Deklin) is there to lend a helping hand – for as long as he and Joan can stand each other, that is. It’s not that they don’t get along, really, it’s that they’ve awkwardly discovered that they knew each other back in the day. As teenagers, Beau and Joan spent a romantic day together but he stood her up at a Christmas tree lighting, and they never saw each other again. In fact, that’s the night Joan met her husband.
Will Joan and Beau reconnect? Was it fate or Christmas magic pushing them together? Will the ghost of Joan’s dead husband haunt the ceremony? Will a terrible tree accident derail the whole thing? Does snowman decorating deteriorate with age? And how many poinsettias is too many poinsettias? Hallmark is the channel with all the answers this Christmas, but a sweet movie like this will remind you that it’s not about the questions, it’s about the cocoa you’re drinking and the sweater you’re wearing when you ask them.
You may or may not be a fan of Hallmark movies and that’s absolutely okay either way. I’ve come to think of them as comfort food in movie form – warm and predictable in a way that makes you feel happy and safe. Not to mention the guaranteed happy ending: when life is hectic and challenging, it can be nice to know that the characters you’re investing in are definitely going to wind up happily ever after.
However, fan of the genre or not, one Hallmark movie was always going to have the distinction of Worst Hallmark Movie, and I humbly nominate Lucky Christmas.
Holly (Elizabeth Berkley) is a single mom who pays for rent in cooking because she never has the cash (thank goodness for obliging grandparent-types). She works three jobs so I’m not sure where that money’s going, but let’s concentrate on the sympathetic figure she cuts and not think too deeply on details – there are bigger problems ahead.
Holly’s about to have good luck and bad luck. Bad luck: someone steals her car clunker from the bar one night. Good luck: those obliging, grandparenty landlords of hers have an unused vintage Camaro she can drive instead. Good luck: she wins the Christmas lottery, worth a million dollars. Bad luck: the winning ticket was in her car. The stolen one.
Across town are two idiot criminal buddies who call to mind Marv and Harry of the Wet Bandits. Mike (Jason Gray-Stanford) and Joe (Mike Bell) are bumbling fools who’ve accidentally set fire to an entire job site, and then accidentally stolen a car and then deliberately held ransom a lottery ticket for a piece of the pie since they know they can’t cash it themselves. If you’re wondering at this point, like I was, when Holly’s going to get her love interest in this damn holiday romance, the bad news is: she already has, and you missed it. You assumed, because of the many, many Hallmark movies like it, that Holly would get a decent guy. Instead, she’s getting Mike, one of the criminals. I resisted this insinuation for so long that I had mentally prepared for Holly to live happily alone forever after, but no, Mike was pretending to like Holly in order to suggest she post a reward (a large percentage of the winnings) for the return of the ticket, but then she unwisely lets him get close to her kid, and she’s apparently got such low self-esteem that a dirty rotten scoundrel is as good as she thinks she can get.
Now I know that Elizabeth Berkley fell pretty far between her stint as Jessie Spano on Saved By The Bell to her turn as Nomi in Showgirls, but this? This is cruel. This is too much.
[Sidebar: am I the only one who watched the recent Saved By The Bell Reboot, for which Jessie Spano returns as a guidance counsellor and AC Slater as the coach? I can’t believe I’m saying this, but…it’s actually pretty good.]
Mike is a loser, and Holly deserves a better fate, for this one can never deliver the happy ending this movie promises. She deserves to discover that not only is she more than enough on her own, it’s actually much preferable to be alone than to be with a partner who will only drag you down. I know Hallmark defines ‘happily ever after’ as coupled, but there’s more to life than romantic love. And what’s romantic about a relationship that starts out as a lie anyway? I realize that watching a Hallmark Christmas movie means just buying into the fantasy and not asking questions, but this, to me, was more of a nightmare.
Travis’s ranch, like many others in Montana, has just barely survived the drought, and now he’s looking to refinance to keep it afloat. In order to secure a second loan, Travis (Colin Ferguson) will have to prove that he can pay it back, which typically means either cutting back on expenses or finding other revenue streams. Travis can’t squeeze any more revenue out of the ranch, but he’s not willing to cut any of his employees either. Enter Sara (Kellie Martin), the businesswoman who’s going to make it happen.
She’s not entirely thrilled to be sent to Montana so close to Christmas, and as a widow and single parent, she’ll have to drag her teenage daughter Chloe along with her, who isn’t even sure there’s wifi in Montana. Actually it turns out to be a much more pleasant experience than either mother or daughter anticipated. Chloe looks up from her screen periodically, long enough to notice that this is the nicest Christmas she and her mother have shared since her dad died. She doesn’t really want to go home.
Sara, however, is a little more ambivalent. She’s falling for Travis, but it’s clear that his ranch is really important to him and he could never leave it. But her career, and her ability to support her daughter and their life in L.A., has to come first. As the sole provider, she can’t take risks. Sadly but responsibly, they agree they can’t be together.
Show of hands: who thinks Sara will find a way to save the ranch? Who thinks Chloe’s constant selfies will somehow play a part? Who thinks Kay’s famous eggnog has rum in it? Can a city girl learn to gather eggs from chickens? Does anyone look good in a Christmas tree hat? Do all cowboys wear bolo ties? Hallmark has all the answers your little heart desires – and more besides, I’ll bet. Prepare to be charmed by Cowboy Colin.
Kendra Adams (Nazneen Contractor) went to school for journalism but wound up writing listicles and personality quizzes at a Buzzfeed knock-off. She’s pretty good at getting readers wondering what kind of reindeer they are, but she’d like to do a little more so she keeps pitching her boss meatier pieces, which her boss summarily rejects.
One day, while browsing an antique store’s jewelry counter for her own mother’s lost engagement ring, she finds a similar one with a unique inscription, “My Christmas Love 1948.” The romance and mystery intrigue our intrepid reporter Kendra, whose subsequent pitch is again rejected but she decides to pursue the story anyway, on her own time. In New England she’s able to trace the ring back to the owner’s grandson, Michael (David Alpay), who was raised by his grandparents but has no memory of the ring. Together they discover the legacy his grandparents left behind, and the sacrifices they both made for what was most important – love.
Will it lead to a story? Or will it lead to something even more important: Kendra’s own romance? Watch and find out – the answer may surprise you!
Her name is Holly (Brooke D’Orsay) but call her Miss Christmas – everyone else does! She’s the official tree finder for Chicago’s big tree lighting event. Those trees are enormous of course, but also need to be full, and well-shaped, and have that certain wow factor to distinguish itself among Chicago’s vibrant skyline. But this year there’s been a tree emergency – the perfect tree was damaged, and with the lighting ceremony just 10 days away, there’s a scramble to find a suitable replacement. Holly resorts to a letter written by Joey, a young boy in Wisconsin who claims to have just the ticket.
Of course, you know it’s not going to be nearly that easy: sure the tree is gorgeous, but it’s also not for sale. Little Joey is willing to part with it, but his dad Sam (Marc Blucas) is most definitely not. It’s kind of a touchy subject because the tree is actually a reminder of Sam’s recently deceased mother, and cutting it down would mean parting with that memory. Other members of the family, however, think it would be the ultimate way to honour her memory since she loved Christmas, and the lighting ceremony in particular.
Now, if, say, Holly were to fall in love with Sam, do you think that would increase her odds of landing the tree? Or do you think, at some point, perhaps she might start to identify with the family a bit more, and want to keep the tree in its proper place? And if she fails to bring a tree back to Chicago, can she legally still be called Miss Christmas? Gosh, so many edge-of-your-seat questions, and only one place to find the answers: the Hallmark channel. Merry watching.
ASSHOLES WATCHING MOVIES 