It’s an Old Story

This movie which premiered on the Hallmark Channel last night is actually one from 2024 which has been running over on Hulu ever since. It reunites stars Daniel Lissing and Jessica Lowndes who were last paired together in an old christmas movie from almost 10 years ago called A December Bride that many remember fondly. If you are a Jessica Lowndes fan, don’t read my review. Although the talented Ms. Lowndes is beautiful if not stunning, I was not a fan of her acting back then and I still am not despite her conquering at least one of her distracting quirks. Daniel Lissing will always have a place in Hallmarkies hearts for his role of Jack, Elizabeth’s dead Mountie husband, in the popular series When Calls the Heart, a show that I have never been interested in personally. Anyway, the nostalgia factor of the pairing surely accounts for Hallmark acquiring this movie from Hulu for its kick-off to this year’s Christmas in July. It can’t have been anything else.

Chelsea and Jake, who have become “America’s Sweethearts” are the hosts of a reality show called “Renovation Romance” in which the pair guide a couple through their relationship challenges while renovating their home. After filming the last show of the season, Chelsea is looking forward to a vacation with Jake to repair some cracks in their own relationship. Jake is not as enthusiastic and when their boss, Don, proposes to cap their season off with a Christmas Special, he is all for it. Chelsea relents because of a huge check to her favorite charity and because she is a people pleaser. Enter Janice, Cooper, and Cooper’s “country cabin” that he inherited from his grandpa. Their relationship is confusing. I thought they were engaged because the idea is that Cooper wants the renovation so they can live in it together, but later in the movie Don wants Cooper to propose to her live on the air. Anyway, Cooper wants to maintain his grandfather’s old world rustic charm and Janice wants to make it sleek, modern, and re-sellable. Chelsea and Jake have their work cut out for them as the couple’s differing taste in architecture extends to their lifestyle choices as well. Cooper is the proverbial country mouse and Janice is the proverbial city mouse. And the proverb is sited in so many words. In case we don’t get it. To make the project even more complicated, the Cabin is decorated for Christmas within an inch of it’s life even though some demolition will be involved. There are a lot of bows which turn out to be very significant at the end. In the middle of the movie they decide that the cabin needs even more Christmas and they add even more Christmas trees and bows. There are at least 15 trees in one room of the cabin at final count.

After the first episode of the show, Jake and a disgruntled Janice suspiciously go off to New York together on supposedly separate business which leaves Cooper and Chelsea to film the renovation project and work on Cooper and Janice’s relationship all by themselves. This was as awkward as it sounds with them flirting shamelessly, having lots of laughs and chemistry together and being deliriously happy without their partners all in front of the camera. After a lot of Christmas-y shenanigans, carpentry, heartfelt discussions, longing gazes, and futile attempts to communicate with their supposed loved ones, Jake and Janice finally return from New York. Don has decided that nothing would be better than a live reunion and reveal of the newly renovated cabin capped off by the previously mentioned marriage proposal! To her credit, Chelsea puts the kabosh on that notion, but a few minutes before the live show, Chelsea decides to break up with a more than willing Jake. During the live filming, Janice, although she is pleased with the cabin, decides she is not so pleased with living there and breaks up with Cooper even though she still loves him but has to live in the city. For some reason at this point, Daniel Lissing decides to look totally heartbroken even though we know that his character Cooper could not have been more pleased and relieved since he is totally in love with Chelsea. It was a very odd acting choice. To save the show, Jake decides that this is a fine time to propose to Chelsea live on the air even though she has just broken up with him. Now this dumpster fire, in the right hands, could have been absolutely hilarious, but the whole thing just comes across as cringe. Foregoing her people pleasing ways, after a tense inner struggle, Chelsea turns him down, turns to the camera, and gives a fine speech to their live audience all about knowing that they would prefer honesty to having everything wrapped up with a big happy, but phony, bow. She walks off and then ruins the whole thing by kicking herself off camera for being an idiot for sacrificing the ratings by all of her silly honesty and authenticity and wishing she had just gone along with Jake’s proposal on the air! But don’t worry, Cooper swoops in with words of wisdom and a big kiss. And just to put another big bow on it, all of the drama has resulted in the live special being a massive hit after all so she’s happy again. Do Janice and Jake get together? No bows tying up that story, I’m afraid.

Almost everything in this movie missed the mark with me by a little or a lot. But frankly, I think the worst thing about it was the Christmas Decorations. Also, at the end, the cabin looks exactly the same as it did before the so-called renovation.