Thanks to Ion, I could watch marathons of holiday movies while puttering about the house, but with the many options available to stream or checkout DVDs from the library, I had to be more discerning and I stopped the bad ones instead of trying to watch them through. I found a cache of non-Hallmark, but well-made movies this year. Finally, I'm applying my new Romance Movie Checklist to each movie I watched this year.
Holiday Rush (Netflix, 2019)- A morning radio show host is out of a job after the station he works for is acquired by a bigger company. He realizes he is broke and has to move his four kids from their posh home and neighborhood to their old house on the other side of town. The DJ and his producer are also planning a way to get back on the air and be true to their roots. Cute story, good production, appropriate acting and a bit of star power with Romany Malco (Weeds) and Darlene Love (20 Feet From Stardom). I only had one issue: bad grammar. The screen text was counting down the days and it said “x day till...” Wrong! I watched it, I can easily watch it again and will happily recommend others watch it too. I like the direction of diversity the HRMs are heading in.
- Cheesy or sentimental: Lightly cheesy, but mostly sentimental
- Production value: This is a high quality Netflix production
- Suspension of belief: low
- Trope: Friends to Lovers
- Diversity: almost entire black cast
- Paranormal: None
- Clownish character: None
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? Maybe next year.
Holiday Road Trip (Netflix, 2013)- A marketing executive is forced to take the company mascot, a dog, on a holiday road tour with the boss’ son. I didn’t finish this one. Patrick Muldoon is possibly on par with Tommy Wiseau from The Room. He is terrible and brought Ashley Scott, who was cute in Christmas Mail, down. It’s too bad because it looked like I was in store for an all-star supporting cast including George Hamilton, Shelley Long, Donna Pescow and Mindy Cohn. Oh well!
Christmas Calendar (Hoopla, 2017)- A woman returns to her small town after going away to school to become a lawyer. She takes over her grandma’s bakery, but soon learns the business is in financial trouble especially with a new, chain store that has its own bakery and cute a French baker just across the street. Oh yeah, it’s called Christmas Calendar because the woman mysteriously receives a Christmas calendar. Soon news spreads that she has a secret admirer that will be revealed when she opens the last calendar door on Christmas Eve. there was a basic story here that was muddied by lots of unnecessary plot vectors that never got flushed out. The story itself didn’t know where it was going. At one point the two bakers were getting ready for a bake-off, but then for no reason the editor skipped past that event and the main characters went bowling instead! The acting was b-level at best and therefore appropriate. I finished it, but there’s no reason to make watching this HRM an annual tradition. There is another movie called The Holiday Calendar on Netflix. This movie should have been called A Christmas Baked Fresh and a Warm.
- Cheesy or sentimental: Unequivocally cheesy.
- Production value: Okay
- Suspension of belief: high
- Trope: muddled version of enemies-to-lovers
- Diversity? There are some colorful extras
- Paranormal element: none
- Clown character: they were all acting silly
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? NO.
2nd Chance for Christmas (Hoopla, 2019)- A stuck up pop-star is acting like a horrible brat to everyone and is visited by the ghost of her grandfather, played by Mark McGrath, telling her to clean up get her act together before she ends up like him, referencing an uncomfortable afterlife. This was heading into a version of A Christmas Carol that was off to a lousy start, so I stopped it. Mark McGrath as a deceased grandfather of a twenty-something?! Too bad because this one also boasted an all-star supporting cast including Tara Reid, Vivica Fox and Mark Christopher Lawrence.
Christmas Contract (Hoopla, 2018)- A winner from Hoopla, finally! This is a familiar story of a single woman who returns to her hometown for Christmas with a fake boyfriend in tow. This time the fake boyfriend is really her best friend’s brother and they signed a contract that if he acts as her boyfriend over Christmas, she will create an author feature website for him. He’s a writer. She’s a web programmer. This started down a rocky road, but soon smoothed out. The writing was surprisingly good and most of the story was believable. Acting and production value were good, too. Star power includes Jason London of Dazed & Confused fame.
- Cheesy or sentimental? Light cheese because of the trope, but nicely sentimental
- Production value? Good. Originally produced by Lifetime.
- Suspension of belief required? Medium
- Trope(s): Enemies-to-Lovers + Fake Relationship
- Diversity? 1 colorful person
- Paranormal/science fiction element? none
- Clownish character(s)? none
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? Yes. Easily enjoyable.
Christmas Homecoming (Hallmark DVD, 2017)- I haven’t seen many HRMs that include the military, so at least for me, this was a unique film. Starting Julie Benz from Dexter and Michael Shanks who looks almost exactly like Erik Thomson the actor from the Australian show 800 Words. The story is about a widowed army wife who rents out her ADU to an injured Army sergeant. They manage to fall in love but along the way, they both have tackle loss and deciding to move on from the past. Acting is well done, there is little need for suspension of reality. Some side stories are handled better than others and for some reason the cheese is ramped up leaving the ending a soggy gooey mess, kind of like Florida Project. I shudder at the thought. I don’t have to see this again, but I wouldn’t turn the channel if it came on.
- Cheesy or sentimental? Mostly sentimental, but ends cheesily.
- Production value? Good
- Suspension of belief required? Low until the end.
- Trope(s): Combo of modified Second-Chance-at-Love and Belated Love Epiphany with a military theme
- Diversity? Supporting characters are authentic and colorful
- Paranormal/science fiction element? None
- Clownish character(s)? None
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? No
- Paranormal/sci-fi: no
Christmas at the Palace (Hallmark DVD, 2018)- This was a cute little predictable tale about two ice skaters who are asked to stay in the fictional country of San Segovia in order to plan and execute a skating show for the country’s founder's day. Yes, both lady ice skaters respectively fall in love with the king and his assistant and are smitten with the young princess. The conflict between the main character and the king is that they think they are too different and want different things, but lo and behold, they really want the same thing: each other, the palace and the princess.
- Cheesy or sentimental? Light cheese
- Production value? Good. Hallmark makes pretty movies.
- Suspension of belief required? Medium.
- Trope(s): Royalty + Invisible Barrier
- Diversity? Not really
- Paranormal/science fiction element? None
- Clownish character(s)? None.
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? No.
The Knight Before Christmas (Netflix, 2019)- Trying to find a different kind of stories this year, I decided to watch this film about a 14th century knight who time travels to modern day 2019 to fulfill his life’s quest where he meets a modern day school teacher and of course, falls in love. Let's face it, with star power like Vanessa Hudgens, who was in 2018's Holiday Calendar (also Netflix) and Josh Whitehouse from Poldark fame, this was a can't miss movie for holiday romance movie buffs like myself. Time travel, British knights, Netflix productions.... a winning combination!
- Cheesy or sentimental? Cheesy, but touching
- Production value? Good. Netflix brings the A game.
- Suspension of belief required? High. The 14th century knight takes traveling into the future surprisingly well! He learns how to use a remote without assistance the first night there. And only after a day or two, she lets him drive her car by himself.
- Trope(s): Fish-out-of-water + time travel + Cowboy (namely a knight)
- Diversity? Yes. That's the good thing about Netflix productions. Color abounds.
- Paranormal/science fiction element? Time travel, a magic medallion and a crone, aka witch
- Clownish character(s)? None.
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? Maybe.
12 Pups of Christmas (Ion, 2019)- A recently broken up canine therapist leaves her practice in NYC to Move to Silicon Valley to take up a job at a failing doggy-tech firm. A combination of acting and writing led the two main characters to be fraught with mood swings and uneven personalities. It felt like the actors didn't have time to develop their characters. Story became muddled with weird and unnecessary plot vectors.
- Cheesy or sentimental? Cheesy!
- Production value? Good. Great choices of locations.
- Suspension of belief required? Medium-high. There were some weird situations that i found hard to swallow.
- Trope(s): Enemies-to-lovers
- Diversity? Sprinkling of color.
- Paranormal/science fiction element? Nono
- Clownish character(s)? None.
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? No
A Christmas Crush- (Ion, 2019)- A woman makes a wish to have her neighbor fall in love with her. The wish comes true, unfortunately she didn’t specify which neighbor and the magic hits the wrong neighbor. So while she fights off the neighbor under the spell, she’s still trying to get to know the neighbor she likes. It was too goofy and it went on for too long. I was praying for the ending. Can’t complain about the acting.
- Cheesy or sentimental? Cheese.
- Production value? Good.
- Suspension of belief required? Medium-high. The whole wish thing.
- Trope(s): Love spell
- Diversity? Nah.
- Paranormal/science fiction element? Yes! Wish magic.
- Clownish character(s)? The neighbor under the wish spell
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? No
Holly Star (Netflix, 2018)- A failed puppeteer returns to her home town for Christmas and has to get a job at the Christmas tree lot to make ends meet. During a near death experience, a memory of seeing her grandpa bury a treasure comes up and she and her close friend become obsessed with finding it. At the same time she begins remembering the friendship she had with the tree lot attendant and has to sort out her feelings for him. Started rough, but quickly became fun, with interesting characters, and fun side stories. This felt very authentic as if the actors really live in this town, went to that bar and were wearing their own clothes. This can easily spin off a sequel. I’d watch this over and over again. Thoroughly enjoyed it!
- Cheesy or sentimental? Sentimental with a sprinkling of cheese
- Production value? Authentic
- Suspension of belief required? Medium
- Trope(s): Buried treasure mystery + friends-to-lovers romance
- Diversity? N! But it was authentic to this town, pretty sure
- Paranormal/science fiction element? No.
- Clownish character(s)? The main character's best friend was a clown, but there were many goofy characters
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? Absolutely
Holiday In the Wild (Netflix, 2019)- A recently separated wife and mother takes a safari vacation by herself to an African resort where she meets a rugged pilot and animal rescuer. A former veterinarian, She decides to stay past her return date and contribute to the elephant rescue efforts. Starring Kristin Davis of Sex In the City fame and Rob Lowe. Acting and story were well done.
- Cheesy or sentimental? Sentimental
- Production value? on-location authentic
- Suspension of belief required? low
- Trope(s): Scars + modified stranded
- Diversity? Yes. This film is set in Africa, so it would be mighty sad if I said no.
- Paranormal/science fiction element? None
- Clownish character(s)? None
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? No
Christmas Love Story: Love at the Christmas Table (Hoopla, 2012)- Super cute story of childhood friends who grew up and apart as adults but came together each year at the kids table of a Christmas Eve party. Despite years of joking and fighting, love and truth won them over in the end. This film included a fun dance sequence. This was amazing! I can’t even call this cheesy because it was an excellent story with great dialogue, fun elements that weren’t distracting and great original holiday music. I would call this an overall good movie and I was surprised to learn that this is the same production company that brought the world the Sharknado series as well as a slew of rip offs and cheesy action/horror flicks. They put their foot into this one, though.
- Cheesy or sentimental? Sentimental
- Production value? Excellent. Authentic sets and personal styling. I really enjoyed the camera work and film techniques used and you would think this was a production on par with Home Alone.
- Suspension of belief required? Low
- Trope(s): Star-crossed/ soul mates
- Diversity? No
- Paranormal/science fiction element? None
- Clownish character(s)? None
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? For sure!
Christmas at Graceland (Hallmark DVD, 2018)- A Memphis native who moved to Chicago for her career is sent back home to seal a business deal. While there she reconnects... with everything! Friends, music, love, and hometown values. It all works out in the end, but in a nice smooth, entertaining Hallmark kind of way. Not to cheesy and not too sweet. Acting was on par, but the voice dubbing in the music scenes was slightly jarring.
- Cheesy or sentimental? Sentimental
- Production value? Good. It’s a Hallmark.
- Suspension of belief required? Low
- Trope(s): Return to hometown + reunion + flame never went out
- Diversity? Key characters are colorful and I think Memphis folks was represented well.
- Paranormal/science fiction element? None
- Clownish character(s)? None
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? No
A Christmas Movie Christmas (Hoopla, 2019)- The story of two sisters facing another unfulfilling Christmas when they make a wish for something more on Christmas Eve. Santa makes that wish come true by transporting them into their own Christmas movie! Cheesy plot and you can see all the standard storylines coming a mile away, but it still doesn’t work out as the sisters might have expected. Can they ruin Christmas in a Christmas movie?
- Cheesy or sentimental? Cheesy, but sentimental
- Production value? Mar Vista Productions are 50/50, but this one was quality with authentic sets, lovely personal styling and wardrobe.
- Suspension of belief required? High, based on wish magic and the fact that they were transported into a Christmas movie, that’s understandable
- Trope(s): Be-careful-what-you-wish-for + love triangle + self-realization
- Diversity? Key characters are colorful and I think Memphis folks was represented well.
- Paranormal/science fiction element? Yes! Another wish magic movie
- Clownish character(s)? Kind of. Paul the baker has amazing supply of red envelopes and talks to his cookies
- Added to the annual holiday romance movie playlist? No
This was so thorough and good. I actually wanted to know more about the two movies you could not finish. McGrath as a grandfather made me laugh and I need to know how it ends. The dog one too. I can't believe you watched so many of these. I don't have themes I watch but this makes me want to check some out next year.
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