Hallmark Movies

Haul Out the Halloween

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“What in the Samhain?”

Taking Christmas decorating drama as far as it could go, what else was Hallmark to do but to move on to the next challenge and take on Halloween? The folks on HOA loving Evergreen Lane, a cul-de-sac in Provo Utah, are thrown into a panic when the Halloween (and Shakespeare) obsessed Marvin and Luna Balmer (The M. Balmers) move into the house vacated by the Jolly Johnsons and start setting up for their favorite holiday of the year. Not Christmas. Something must be done. It’s Evergreen Lane, not Everscream Lane. They call in the big guns, Jared (Wes Brown), President of the HOA, and Emily (Lacey Chabert) Director of mumble mumble Activities, just back from their honeymoon. To not shorten a long story, when Emily was a child, she was traumatized when a mean girl, Ashlynn Ashworth “Yard Yelped” her by scaring her with scarecrows on Halloween shortly before the death of her beloved Grandmother. From then on, the neighbors dialed back all of the other holiday decorations to focus only on Christmas to protect Emily. The Ashworths pulled up stakes and moved away shortly thereafter. However, the ban on Halloween was never officially written into the bylaws of the HOA (!). So, Alas poor Yorick, the Balmers can not be stopped. A Big cul-de-sac meeting is called, and led by sweet and kind Emily, they decide to welcome the Balmers and in a “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ’em” spirit, totally embrace all of the art and science of Halloween celebration complete with costumes, contests, yard displays, and child-friendly activities. (They agree to only go up to 5 on the “Nosferatu Scale”.) It doesn’t hurt that thanks to Luna Balmer’s life being saved when she was just a kid, all proceeds will go to the local Children’s Hospital. And as Emily points out, Halloween is for remembering the dead, and this year’s celebration will be the perfect tribute to Emily’s Gram-Gram.

I really liked this one much more than the previous two Haul Out the Holly movies, which had some very problematic and disturbing aspects to them. The fascist undertones of the HOA were dialed down considerably. It was very fast paced and the wisecracks, jokes, and gags came thick and fast. And they were mostly quite funny. I probably missed a lot of them, but one that stands out was when Jared calls Emily’s messy attic “the portal to Pan’s Labyrinth”. It was very episodic with no one gradually unfolding plotline to be seen. The neighbors tackle a number of challenges including baking contest drama, Jared’s dismay over his widowed mother being courted by weird Ned (Stephen Toblowsky), Jared’s suspension as HOA president, and Emily not being fulfilled in her career and wanting to write children’s books. Also it turns out that the local media star who holds in her hands the success or failure of the money raising aspect of the cul-de-sac’s Halloween hijinks is none other than Ashlynn Ashworth, the mean girl whose family may or may not have been chased out of the neighborhood when she dared to scare young Emily out of her wits. But no one, not even a former mean girl, can resist the niceness of Lacey Chabert’s Emily. So we were not worried. Even though a lot of the side stories kind of fizzled out, I would certainly be on board with another one with these next year. Perhaps an Independence Day or Thanksgiving Day edition? This was fun and silly. If you can embrace that, it’s a treat, not the other thing.

Rating: 8 out of 10.

Home Turf

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Extracurricular Activities

I will give this one extra credit for a pretty unusual and fun premise. Nikki Deloach plays Cassidy, a tightly wound new president of a small Ohio university trying to save The Arts program from being cut. Warren Christie does a nice job as the new college football coach trying to lead his struggling team to its first win. When the pipes burst in the dorm flooding out 21 members of the football team, the only solution is to put 5 of them up in the 10+ bedroom mansion that functions as the home of the President of the University. Of course they act like barbarians destroying Cassidy’s peace and quiet and her flower pots. They also drink her oat milk and don’t use coasters. In order to corral the savage beasts (a.k.a. teenage boys and football players to boot) Nikki insists that Logan move into the room above the garage to keep his guys in line. The whole set up was jam packed full of all sorts of opportunities for romance and humor. It makes one wonder why it’s never been used before (to my knowledge).

Back story time! Cassidy is one of Hallmark’s highly organized very busy, busy, busy but closed off  (but enthusiastic!) personalities who feels like she can’t depend on anyone but herself. This is because of her ex-husband. He did the usual “let his wife put him through school but when it was his turn to return the favor, he bails.” The President before Cassidy had handled the school’s budget irresponsibly leaving a big mess on her hands. Logan is the son of a legendary coach of “Buckeye State” University whose shadow he has always struggled in. He had been one of his dad’s assistant coaches at the Division I school, but had to leave despite his success due to charges of nepotism. Cuz that never happens in Football. That is why he has landed at Whittendale College. Together they formulate a plan to get a very rich alumnus to donate money to build a new football stadium in order to save the Arts program (!!!???). You may well be scratching your heads over this plan, but it turns out the millionaire they have set their sights on loves The Arts but loves football more. And as everyone knows football brings in a lot of revenue which will trickle down to The Arts. Yeah.

Now don’t ask me why the parsimonious board would target The Arts program in the first place rather than some other program (like football?). After all, it is The Arts program that the small college is known for and presumably attracts more aspiring The Arts students than student-athletes. “The cost of instruments” is thrown out there as justification but that doesn’t fly because according to my research, usually student musicians provide their own instruments. Do Student Athletes provide their own helmets and pads? I don’t think so. I guess we will just have to go with the well known fact that it is always The Arts program, no matter what, that is sacrificed when there is a budget shortfall in school-based movies.

Warren Christie and Nikki DeLoach were a nice match. They were age appropriate for each other and for their characters. It was not their first movie together and they had a good rapport. Nikki kind of over-did her character’s initially jittery personality in my view, but I’ll give her a pass on this one because she is usually one of Hallmark’s most exceptional actresses. After their coffee-spillage meet cute, the romance proceeded smoothly and believably with a kiss in the middle of the movie like mature adults. The almost break up at the end was for good reason as Logan did a really bad thing. They both had good character arcs with Cassidy learning how to loosen up, become a team player, and embrace her little ersatz family. Logan learned that there is more to building a good team than good discipline and to be his own man not a carbon copy of his famous Dad. And of course the young men learned many many things from “Mommy and Daddy”. “Respect the Wood!” 7 1/2 stars.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10.

Adventures in Love & Birding

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Love Birds

Back to the Hallmark saltmines (I kid) after a three week hiatus while The Groomsmen trilogy was being shown instead of new premieres. I had already seen them thanks to a free trial of Hallmark+. They weren’t horrible or anything, but not particularly memorable either and I had no desire to see them again for reviewing purposes. 

This seemed like it could be a promising back to business movie as it paired two longtime Hallmark veterans for the very first time in a Hallmark (which was hard to believe). Predictably, they were very good together in this first of the “Fall Into Love” grouping. Only a few weeks until “Countdown to Christmas!” Yikes!  Rachel Boston was her usual very very animated self and Andrew Walker was Andrew Walker, which is a pretty good thing. It was about the hobby of birding which was different. They were age appropriate for their roles which caused the movie not to lose 1 (or sometimes 2) stars in my 1 to 10 star rating scale.

Rachel plays Celeste who was recently dumped by her husband of 22 years. She is fine though, other than the usual busybody friends who are trying to set her up with various men and are constantly hounding her to “get back out there” when all she wants to do is reorganize the garage. She is also a little verklempt because her high school senior daughter will be going away to college soon. She wants to spend more time with her but her daughter has her own busy life. Actually, her daughter is trying to distance herself a little to prepare for the wrench of leaving her home and Mom. Also she is nursing some doubts about going to college right away, but we don’t know that yet. Andrew plays John who was recently dumped by his long time girlfriend and birding partner. He quit pursuing his doctorate and left teaching for an office job which pissed her off. He likes the outdoors and wants to start his own birding guide business. (Add this one to the Hallmark Dubious Business list.) Celeste is recruited by a mutual friend to be John’s birding partner in the annual NorCal Ornithological Society’s Bird-a-Thon. And Celeste gets the idea that she is supposed to pretend like she is his fake girlfriend as well as mutual birding enthusiast to show up the cheating competitive b**ch who is also participating. She is mistaken in this extra assignment, which leads to an amusing first meeting with John in front of his Ex and her new partner/boyfriend. The stakes are a lot higher this year because a corporate sponsor has put up prize money to the tune of “5 figures”. So if he wins it, the 10,000 to 99,999 dollar prize (I’m guessing closer to the lower figure) will decide John’s path in life: risk going into the Bird guide business or staying on the corporate fast track at the office. By the way, the number of different birds each couple count in the 3 week long contest (the highest count wins), is run on the honor system. That seemed very naive to me especially this year since money was involved. They couldn’t take a picture of the birds they spot? Just to keep honest people honest? Sounds like Bad Business to me.

Anyway, bird montages and romance ensue. Besides the birding, Celeste and John also attend some outside functions together and the relationship building was good. Extra points for a rare mid-movie uninterrupted kiss. Rachel and Andrew had an easy rapport and really played well together. The secondary story of Celeste and her daughter Morgan’s changing relationship and Morgan’s doubts about her future played well also. I even had a little sniffle at  the end. Speaking of Morgan, the actress who played her, Talisa Mae Stewart looked awfully familiar. It turns out she is a dead ringer for similarly named Taissa Farmiga who played Gladys in The Gilded Age.

Talisa
Taisa

 

So that was pretty interesting. The last minute temporary break up was dumb as usual but at least it didn’t involve hearing one half of a private conversation while eavesdropping and totally getting everything ass-backwards. All in All, lots more good than bad. A respectable but unspectacular “7”.

Rating: 7 out of 10.

Catch of the Day

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Doesn’t Flounder

**Spoilers Ahoy**

My reaction to this one is similar to last week’s premiere. That is, nothing to write home about, but likable and an easy watch. It managed to avoid the most irritating tropes including the last minute “misunderstanding due to miscommunication”. It hit enough of the usual Hallmark beats to give off that nostalgic comfortable feel. And it lacked anything super annoying, barring Evelyn, the truly awful and mean boss of our heroine, that is. But those over the top meanies can be a good thing if dealt with correctly by the end. I spent half the movie in suspense hoping for a massive telling off/”serves you right!” scenario. I was thinking this movie will rise or fall on what happens with Evelyn. It wasn’t quite the bolt of lightning moment I was hoping for, but it was good enough and at least the big showdown was face to face.

Sophie is a talented chef working at an elite fine dining restaurant in New York City. She is promoted to head sous chef and is one step closer to her dream of being an executive chef. Inconveniently, she receives a call from her sister who is struggling to run the family seafood restaurant in Montauk Long Island. She needs her help to get ready for the make or break July 4th celebration. The restaurant is dying a not-so-slow death, and to make things worse, it just got a bad review from a local influencer who bemoans how far this former Montauk institution has fallen since the death of their father. If Sophie can’t help, they will have to sell, which would make her mother very unhappy. Evelyn reluctantly gives Sophie 10 days off instead of the 3 weeks she asked for on the condition that Sophie prepares an impressive meal for some investors she will be entertaining there in her mansion on Montauk. Evelyn is the typical Hallmark Bad Boss: harsh, unappreciative, entitled, and unreasonable. In case we missed her role in the movie, when Sophie makes a command appearance at her vacation home but with her two nieces in tow and asks for some water for the little girls, Evelyn reacts like they are asking for pints of blood. Her own blood.

Sophie is scandalized when she gets to her family’s restaurant. She rarely visits since she doesn’t get any time off. The decor is tired, there are no customers, and horrors, they are using frozen fish instead of fresh when they are in one of the salt water fishing capitals of the world. Her sister, who doesn’t even like to cook, is financially and emotionally stressed, and even though Sophie is right in her criticisms, you can’t help but feel for both of them. I liked that there were no villains or idiots here. When the sisters said something hurtful to each other or had a disagreement, it was not silly but understandable and they both acted like adults and apologized in a timely manner. And that also goes for Sophie and Cam, the love interest. Sophie decides to shut the place down temporarily and have a grand re-opening on July 4. Whether they sell up or keep on going will depend on that crucial day.

When Sophie goes down to the docks to score some fresh fish, she runs into an old beau who gave her the cold shoulder in highschool, who runs his Dad’s fishing business. They re-fall in love over dinners, field trips, and walks on the beach which serve to showcase the beauty and appeal of Montauk. They seem to have plenty of time on their hands to re-kindle the romance even though she only has less than a week and a half to whip the old restaurant back into shape including a new menu, hiring a manager, establishing a social media presence, and re-decorating. Not to mention planning and preparing a stellar Michelin star level feast for Evelyn’s investors. This is standard operating procedure for Hallmark heroes and heroines when faced with a life altering impossible-to-meet deadline. Thankfully, I no longer get stressed out over the main couple’s poor time management skills and lack of urgency. I just go with it, trusting in Hallmark magic to avoid failure and disaster. At least Sophie comments on how much she has to do and looks stressed from time to time. Needless to say, as we see how wonderful her life could be at home in Montauk it becomes obvious to everyone but Sophie where her happy and fulfilling future lies. Especially contrasted with Evelyn’s unpleasantness and abuse. 

Like last week’s movie, this one was filmed partially in the United States (what’s going on?), but it ups the ante by being filmed right there in Montauk and environs. The show runners took full advantage, and I wish I could go there. Michael Rady, who played Fisherman Cam, and Emilie Ullerup, who played Sophie were a good match. The relationship was built realistically.  Sophie’s overhaul of her family restaurant wasn’t entirely smooth sailing (providing some humor), and the romance with Cam wasn’t either.  It took a while for Sophie to see how happy her future could be running her family restaurant compared with what her life would be continuing to work for Evelyn. Thanks to her heroics planning the meal for Evelyn’s investors, including overcoming disasters not of her making, Evelyn finally realizes Sophie’s worth and offers her the executive chef position at her new restaurant…in Las Vegas. In case it wasn’t obvious what Sophie would ultimately do, that revelation pretty much sealed the deal. Sophie herself doesn’t get it until on the helipad with Evelyn on the way out of Montauk. The confrontation scene was OK even though there was no screaming involved and they both acted like mature adults. Sophie even got back in time to enjoy the 4th of July fireworks with her family and her man.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10.

Double Scoop

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Déjà Moo

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Man, I can’t be too hard on this one. This was a very innocuous old fashioned Hallmark story which didn’t try to be anything other than what it was. Since it succeeded in reaching that unambitious bar, and did nothing to get on my bad side, I’m hovering between a 6 and a 7 out of 10 on my special Hallmark Scale. Someday, I’ll have to define exactly what that is. Stay tuned. Also it had a few saving graces in addition to the nostalgic vibe.

Nora (Taylor Cole) and James (Ryan McPartlin) are two successful Advertising Executives who are vying for the business of the same ice cream company. They used to work for the same top NYC agency until  Nora followed Alexandra, one of their vice presidents who quit to go off on her own. The culture of her new company is more humanistic, emphasizes a strong work/life balance (a favorite Hallmark ethos lately) and less cutthroat than the agency she left which James still works for. Needless to say, he is up for a big promotion if he lands this account, which will make or break their rival, the small still struggling start-up. So there you have it. The duo are not initially too friendly as James once got credit for Nora’s work, and apparently he did nothing to rectify that, and Alexandra chose Nora over James to bring with her to her new firm. Nora is a better person than James, obvs. (Later we get a sob story from James which explains his character failings which he apologizes for.) James and Nora agree on a set of rules while they compete for the dairy farm’s business which boils down to “no funny stuff.” 

The duo bond over cute little baby cows, delicious ice cream, farm chores, and a festival. Also there is the granddaughter of the elderly dairy farm couple/ice cream makers, whose hobby is udderly lame cow puns. I love stupid puns, but these were not even remotely a-moo-sing.  Of course at the end, James’ boss does engage in unethical business practices which sets up the big ending conflict. At least it is a legit one. It really looks as if James stabbed Nora in the back to win the account. Which he does (win the account). At first. Until he makes it right. 

If you are aiming to spend 2 hours engaging in a low risk, low expectation Hallmark experience, this one will fit the bill. It stars two Hallmark mainstays, Taylor Cole being more main than Ryan McPartlin. 41 year old Taylor and 50 year old Ryan have both been around a while in the Hallmark universe. Taylor Cole is one of the more classically beautiful Hallstars. Both look great although Ryan’s teeth are a little unsettling and sometimes Taylor’s hairstyle looks better in some scenes than others. Sorry! They were good together, and funny trying to ingratiate their New York selves with the down home farm people while hiding their ill feelings. The plot line fit their ages, which was unusual enough and a definite positive. Also, although set in Wisconsin, it was not filmed in Canada, but Alabama, U.S.A! You can never go wrong with ice cream, and the gimmick for the little company is sweet and savory inventive flavors which sounded…interesting: Blue Cheese and Honey Roasted Pear, Mascarpone and Balsamic Strawberry, Vanilla Bean and Smoked Maple, Apple Ginger Snap. Cowabunga! I particularly liked Chondra Pierce who played the grandmother. Great Voice! The actors who played the two bosses were familiar and good-to-see faces as well. Popular and always busy actor Patrick Muldoon played bad guy Everett. The actress who played Alexandra, the nice boss, looked very familiar to me and at first I thought it was another second tier Hallmark regular, but it turned out to be Elisa Donovan, who hilariously played Amber, Cher’s nemesis, in Clueless! Even the cows looked familiar but I was thinking of the Chick-Fil-A ads and bill boards. I think this is one of those ones which might improve upon re-watch.

Rating: 7 out of 10.

Providence Falls

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It Fell

Am I the only one in the whole wide world who did not absolutely love this 3 part mini-series? Apparently so. Oh, there were some good things about it, for sure. I liked the actors: 4 new fresh faces in lead roles, an old favorite (Matty Finochio) in a pivotal role, and 2 Hallmark mainstays in small but important parts. Kudos to Niall Matter who played a bad guy against type. The set direction and production values were top notch, and there were parts of the script that were just fine. But the whole thing felt forced and manufactured around a very faulty premise. It didn’t make sense and was just wrong. And I’m not talking about the angels and devils, the dual timeline, the time travel, or the reincarnation. I usually like that stuff. Some of Hallmark’s best movies have been based on those kinds of plots. And part of what bothered me was that they dropped the love story and all the supernatural stuff right in the middle of a police procedural for no reason I can think of that made any sense. Except to stretch maybe 3 hours of story into 6 hours. 

Cora and Liam are star-crossed lovers in 1844 Ireland who met when Liam, a thief and a rogue, broke into her father’s country estate to steal some things. They fell in love and were running away together, when, chased by dogs, torches, and pitchforks, Cora fell off a cliff and died. Liam is miserable and blames himself, but instead of being reincarnated or sent to heaven or, as they call it here, “H.E. double hockey sticks”, he is put in Limbo for almost 200 years due to a clerical error. Doesn’t heaven have some kind of quality control department? That was disturbing. Of course he had to die first and I am afraid I am a little fuzzy on how that happened. He comes to our attention because they are “clearing Limbo out”. Liam is given a chance to make up for cutting Cora’s life short and taking her away from her soulmate (who she barely met) and her important destiny and earn his way into heaven. Somehow, her death is all Liam’s fault, not her own nor the trackers chasing her over hill and dale and off the cliff. Or just an accident for that matter. All he has to do, in the present time, is to get Cora, who has been re-incarnated, back together with her so-called soulmate that she barely met, who has also been reincarnated. Cora is now a newly promoted police detective in Providence Falls, and Liam is a visiting detective (Ha!), her new partner. Her soulmate Finn (Evan Roderick) is an Assistant D.A. and is a good guy and very attractive. But despite Hallmark trying to fool us, savvy Hallmarkies know he is not the one because instead of coffee he drinks tea with sugar in it, is a lot shorter than Liam, and is a little too well-groomed. Also an old cohort of 1844 Liam is back and has been re-incarnated as the police chief. And maybe some other people? I don’t know. 

So we have 6 hours including commercials of Liam getting used to cell phones, cars, and other 21st century things and pushing his beloved Cora into the arms of Finn, who she really is not all that interested in. Just as she did back in Ireland, she has fallen for Liam at first sight. And Finn likes her best friend Suzette. Could it be possible that it is Liam and not Finn who is Cora’s soulmate? Nope, nope, nope, absolutely not. Destiny and Fate cannot be wrong, and Destiny has spoken. Even though against all of the rules in the Destiny Rule Book, Cora has started to remember her history with and love for Liam in her former life. So Destiny is wrong about some things then. But according to the angel Samael, the lady in charge of this fiasco, if she reunites with selfish bad Liam, instead of good and decent Finn, she will not be able to continue to help at-risk youth and keep them on the straight and narrow. Somehow this capable woman cannot do her good works unless she’s with the right man. I think Miss Samael got her centuries mixed up. Meanwhile Liam is proving over and over what a reformed character he is. But no, according to this angel Samael, he is selfish and bad to the end even when he is rescuing Finn from an old mine shaft and throwing himself in front of a speeding bullet to save Cora’s life. Repentance? Forgiveness? Grace? Free Will? Fuhgettaboutit. And all through this, there is a very drawn out murder mystery/burglary/criminal conspiracy to solve that was right out of the usual Hallmark Movies and Mysteries playbook.

I understand why everyone really liked this. It was a well-done ambitious production for Hallmark, and the trappings were off the usual beaten track, even though the love story was predictable and the mystery was tedious. I just couldn’t get past that damn angel Samael being so blind and misguided: Insisting that poor Liam could not get into heaven despite his proven goodness unless Cora ended up with Finn against both of their wills. I know it was to create tension and keep the thing going for 6 hours. But it was just wrong and flew in the face of what angels are supposed to be about. I couldn’t believe it when the Angel Gabriel (Brendan Penny) showed up to save the day, and he told her what a good job she did! He left Liam’s fate up to her as long as she first finally listened to the one good angel with some sense, her assistant, Agon, Liam’s handler. She should have been fired and threatened with H.E. double hockey sticks.

Rating: 6 out of 10.

Unwrapping Christmas: Olivia’s Reunion

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All Wrapped Up.

This is the last of the 4 little movies about 4 women who own an all-year-round gift-wrapping store. My review title is apt.  I’ll try not to let the complete absence of the Magical Gift Paper Making Machine affect my rating. As if to make up for it though, Olivia’s dog Ivy gets more of the spotlight and  he is one of the most adorable Hallmark dogs ever. Ivy did not receive a much deserved screen credit for his or her role. He or she needs an agent.

While out delivering gifts that have been “All Wrapped Up” (the name of the store) a few days before The Gala, Olivia (Cindy Busby) knocks on the door of the remote vacation home of the woman who ordered them and finds herself face to face with her ex-boyfriend Ben (current occupation unknown) whom she hasn’t seen for several years. No it wasn’t one of those meddling sneaky mother set ups that Hallmark is so fond of. Ben’s mother, who has taken the rest of the family skiing leaving Ben alone in the cabin, is, as they say, “a lot”, and does not like Olivia because she blames their split on her, even though he was the one who left for New York. Anyway, being set in Minnesota in the winter, they get snowed in alone together.

This was basically a very simple and pleasant romance as the two leads slowly iron out their problems and resume their relationship. I liked it pretty well, mostly for what did not happen, rather than what did. First there were no festivals, and nothing needed to be saved. There was no flirty food fight or other silly tom foolery (Mostly because there was no food in the fridge except for a banana.) No ice skating or snowman construction or snow ball throwing. It was positively refreshing! It was just Ben and Olivia talking and stuff like finding Christmas decorations in the basement and Olivia showing Ben her bow making  accumen (bow making is Olivia’s specialty.) Ben’s mother tries to fix up Ben with Jen, the local store owner from afar, but Jen was nice. No cattiness at all. In fact, Olivia invites her back to the cabin for Christmas as her family is away. There is some simmering suspense as to what Mom’s reaction will be when she finds out that the (w)itch who broke her baby’s heart has been alone in the cabin with him the whole time.  And the confrontation did not disappoint. Mom was very rude, but is swiftly set right by Ben and all was smoothed over. Best of all, there was no last minute misunderstanding that has half of the fledgling couple stomp off into the sunset. Olivia in fact does hear part of a conversation while eavesdropping, but what she hears is Ben defending her to his mother and it seals the deal on their happy ending. That has got to be a first. Admittedly, there was a hint of “bad business” but it had to do with Jen, the nice store owner and was very much a side issue. Jen even gets a hint of a happy ending of her own. So nice.

This low key easy-going little diversion would not have worked without likable actors and characters. Ben is played by Jake Epstein who is a favorite of mine. He and Cindy made a good pair and I have always really liked Cindy Busby too. Going off topic here, but she deserves props for not hiding her age on IMDb even though she is one of the older actresses for Hallmark. She looks as great as ever and (also off-topic) her makeup is pretty and natural, as always. Seemingly, Hallmarkies either love her or hate her. But will the bridge be repaired in time for Olivia to make it to The Gala in time to win the bow-making contest? We already know the answer as we have seen Cindy’s dramatic entrance, with Ben in tow, in the three previous movies. There were some continuity problems and other head-scratchers in the movie (like why is Cindy’s dress red in the movie but gold on the poster?). But they were easy for me to shrug off. **7 stars/10**- The best of the bunch.

Rating: 7 out of 10.

Unwrapping Christmas: Lily’s Destiny

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Signs

In the third installment of the Gift wrapping lalapalooza, we don’t hear much about the all so important Christmas Gala this time. That’s because there is so much else going on! Lily (Ashley Newbrough), the marketing and publicity director, is very busy going on actual dates, hosting a cocktail party to promote Gala ticket sales, mentoring an intern from a business school, and dealing with participating (or not participating) in “The Festival of Trees.” Busy Busy Busy.

While Tina was very super-organized and tightly wound and Mia was a romantic dreamer, Lily’s #1 personality trait is her belief in fate, signs from the universe, and horoscopes. Also she is dealing with Dead Parent Syndrome as far as Christmas tree decorating. This has caused her to not decorate a Christmas Tree for the Festival of Trees which is a neighborhood activity that everyone in the twin cities goes to. Strangely, it is not held in the neighborhood but in what appears to be a local school gymnasium. It is also strange that Lily’s sadness over her father’s death a year ago only affects her ability to decorate two trees. I can go with her not wanting to use her box of her father’s memory-laden decorations for her main home tree, but what does that have to do with the tree for the festival? The rest of her house is all decked out in Christmas bling including at least one other tree. Her lonely barren tree in the Gym has incurred the wrath of her next door neighbor whose zeal for the F of Ts rivals that of the HOA in the Haul out the Holly movies, and is just as scary. BTW, Festival of Trees trees are all very unimpressive and institutional looking. Do better, Hallmark.

Lily has two men vying for her hand, and they were the highlight of this movie. All of the “signs” (Literally. Batchelor #1, Owen, a star realtor and super salesman, has his handsome mug peering down on The Twin Cities from numerous billboards which are seemingly following Lily around whispering to her to date him.) Franco Lo Presti stole the show as Owen, who, as well as being the most eligible bachelor in the city, turns out to be a smug, self-satisfied know-it-all. The actor was perfectly cast as he is too good-looking to live with a head of hair that deserves its own screen credit.  Although he was a hoot as the wrong guy,  Lo Presti managed to give the character some vulnerability and conveyed the sense that maybe he was just trying too hard to impress the gorgeous and successful Lily. After he hilariously oversteps at her Christmas Cocktail Hour she breaks up with him pretty quickly for a Hallmark Heroine. Usually, it takes a while for the HH to get hit with the clue-stick. The other guy, Sean, is played by Torrance Coombs who turns out to be “The One.” He was also really good as the humble nice guy, who was also very attractive and charming. Lily and he hit it off immediately but are separated by each thinking that the other are in serious relationships. Another prime example of Hallmark’s characters not using their words.

Everything is ironed out in the end with the tree decorating and the romantic misunderstanding but there is a jaw-dropping twist at the end regarding the Gala’s Gift Wrapping Contest. No spoilers here! Hopefully, next week, in the conclusion of the series, we will have a reappearance of the magical Gift Wrapping Machine which turns polaroid snapshots into real wrapping paper. It has been absent since its debut in the first movie. I am really looking forward to getting another look at that thing. It was awesome.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10.

Unwrapping Christmas: Mia’s Prince

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Furoshiki

This is the second one in the gift wrapping series and the business is still burbling along quite nicely. Of course it is, we are still rehashing the week before Christmas from the first movie with the 4 women preparing for the Christmas Gala.  I still don’t have any faith in the long term viability of their gift wrapping shop when it’s not gift-giving season. We will never get to see how the women fare during the barren retail desert of January and February. But thankfully in this one we don’t get even a hint of any of Tina’s stupid woes securing The Alford House as the venue. This is all about Mia who is in charge of the decorating and the catering among other things. I liked this one a lot better than the first one for several reasons. For one, I actually liked Mia and Kathryn Davis did a nice job with the character. She had challenges with getting the decorations right (the idiot vender sent her “Marlins” instead of “Garlands”) and the caterer will cancel at the last minute to provide a crisis and some suspense. But her problems were not self-inflicted and did not suck all of the air out of the movie. They stayed in the background with Mia yelling over the phone and sighing occasionally, but by and large she just handled it with no muss or fuss. The main story was how gentle, romantic, and too sweet for her own good, Mia, learns to stand up for herself and not let people take advantage of her good nature.

Mia is a dreamer and a hopeless romantic who loves to read. Her favorite book is an early 19th century novel called Christmas at Derbyshire. Think Jane Austen but more romantic and cliché. She has been saving for over a year working her little gift-wrapping fingers to the bone to buy a first edition from her local book shop. So right from the start, I liked and empathized with Mia. In the midst of competently preparing for the gala, two things happen. Her sister, who has always overshadowed and dominated her, shows up unexpectedly and steamrolls her into letting her crash at her apartment for several days as she just lost her Chef job. Along with her cat to which which Mia is allergic. This forces Mia to spend the night at the shop on the couch. She is awakened by a handsome guy knocking on the window because of a gift-wrapping emergency. He thinks the store is open because Mia fell asleep reading (awh) with the lights on. It is the prince of … : Mia’s Prince! Or a reasonable facsimile.

Beau Cavanaugh (Nathan Witte) is from a wealthy and socially prominent family. He is very nice with kind soft eyes and is immediately smitten with sweetie-pie Mia. It’s mutual, once Mia realizes the next morning that she didn’t just dream him up and he is a real guy. His mother Claire, however, is a stone-cold (w)itch. And therein lies the drama. Besides Mia not being good enough society-wise for her son, it turns out that she has engineered a forced engagement between Beau and Penelope, the daughter of a prominent white family who has her own secret romance going with another guy. (Very 19th Century!) Beau and Penelope are good friends, but, as Beau explains to Mia, he is really not engaged. Except he is, because Backboneless Beau is too much of a wuss to stand up to his terrifying mother, even when she books the wedding venue and sets the date for the wedding without consulting him or Penelope! Mia, bless her, puts her foot down, tells him off, very eloquently I might add (twice!), and breaks up with him. And guess what? When Beau finally stands up to Claire about Mia, Mom basically tells him, “what took you so long to stop being a wimp?” Lanette Ware, who plays the mother, steals every scene she is in.

As for the Gala, despite Mia’s challenges with the decorations and the caterer, we already know it goes off without a hitch because of the movie last week. The main focus is how Mia irons out her problems with her overbearing sister, and what happens when she finds out that the beloved first edition she has been faithfully saving for gets sold out from under her. I won’t spoil it for you (Hahaha) but it was neatly wrapped up with a pretty bow on top. And a kiss under the Mistletoe. Taking 1/2 a star off for Beau being such a weakling.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10.

A Machu Picchu Proposal

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Which does not take place on Machu Picchu

This is the last of the Passport to Love series before we once again experience Christmas in July at Hallmark next week. Time flies. Dan and Katie are twins and throughout the movie they throw out terms like Twin-Tuition, Twin Talk Time, Sacred Circle of Truth, and put their fists on their hearts as a gesture of solidarity. So that was annoying. They also are alike in that they both have been raised to believe that planning and organization are the keys to a happy successful life. Spontaneity and impulsiveness make them very uncomfortable. No prizes for guessing the kind of people they end up with by the end of the movie.

Dan, who does something with cutting edge technology,  is going to Peru to visit his girlfriend and meet her family before proposing to her at Machu Picchu. That’s the plan, anyway. Katie is a high school Home Economics teacher. That gave me pause. I didn’t know that they even still taught “Cooking and Sewing” in highschool. And that is Katie’s own description of her field. Dan finds her in her classroom testing out Bolognese sauce during the summer break in preparation for her fall classes. He wants Katie to help plan the proposal which must be amazing and spectacular and because she speaks Spanish and he doesn’t. Even though this is a spur of the moment invitation which is just the kind of thing that Katie dislikes, he guilts her into going with him. Something about her weighing one more pound than him when they were born. And off they go.

When Dan and Luciana, his girlfriend, meet up in her hometown, they find that she has surprisingly (yep) invited an old friend from school, Carlos, to hang with them. Carlos, like Luciana, is easygoing, a free spirit, and prone to spur of the moment changing of plans. And, true to form, by virtue of his ability to make friends everywhere, Carlos has without consultation committed the four to a “behind the scenes” VIP tour of Machu Picchu for that very day. Poor Dan! Poor Katie! They are not happy about having to cancel their meticulously planned out visit/marriage proposal that was to take place on Thursday, after Dan has met Luciana’s family and asked her father permission to ask for her hand. Luciana, however, is thrilled with the new plan, and Dan and Katie’s concerns (they have already bought the tickets) are waved away. They go to the ancient lost city, Dan gets altitude sickness, Katie can’t work the camera, and the proposal is thwarted. And so it goes.

That proposal did not work out and neither do the subsequent attempts at other tourist destinations in the area. The brother and sister blame Carlos for these failures, but it is mostly their own fault. Dan gets drunk, gets a rash from an alpaca poncho, drinks a glass full of a milk-based Peruvian drink when he is allergic to dairy, and they lose the engagement ring while making chocolate. In addition to the cocoa bean tutorial, the viewer is treated to all kinds of interesting activities and some great scenery. In no particular order, we visit the Mara salt mines and learn about that, the city of Cuzco, the Sacred Valley, learn about Rainbow Mountain, visit Pisac, the spiritual center of Peru, visit an alpaca farm, make empanadas, and eat all kinds of other local delicacies, including bugs. Katie and Dan decide that they must keep the proposal a secret from impetuous unpredictable Carlos and that the occasion must be photographed with Dan’s state of the art 360 degree live-streaming camera. The upshot is that by the almost end of the movie Luciana is still unproposed to but Katie and Carlos have formed a romantic attachment. Katie has learned to be more spontaneous which leads her to set up the perfect proposal for her brother so, thank God, Luciana gets asked for her hand in marriage. But NOT at Machu Picchu!  And, even though Dan has been kind of a drag throughout the movie (including an ugly and senseless argument with Katie), for some reason, she accepts. Honestly, I fear for the relationships of both couples, once they return to Chicago. Katie learns to appreciate spontaneity, but Carlos doesn’t change a bit. Luciana and Carlos have more in common. They even visit romantic Rainbow Mountain together without their ostensible love interests! I was amazed why neither Katie nor Dan seemed to be at all threatened by their relationship. Which was very mature of them. I guess?

Usually, Rhiannon Fish really leans into a “wide-eyed dorkily hapless” schtick with her acting style. This movie is no exception, though she does tone it down just a bit in this one. Alex Santos, who plays Carlos, is very cute and charming. But apparently my unease over his relationship with Rhiannon will prove justified. He will already have moved on next week as the love interest of Natalie Hall in the first of the July Christmas movies. Glad to see him again so soon, however unfortunately timed, Hallmark.

Rating: 6 out of 10.