Romance

Marry Me For Christmas (2013)

Marry Me For Christmas (2013)

Director:

Roger Melvin

Starring:

Victoria Rowell

Malinda Williams

Karon Riley

Plot:

To appease her family during the holidays, a single woman pretends to be engaged to her employee.

Review:

I like that this movie has sequels, more of these types should. It’s very family focused and a bit light on the romance. The tried and true trope of pretend engagement, is always a favorite though this one didn’t play out very realistically. There was not much affection between the two, though, they tried to imply that it was supposed to develop because the guy was trying to take her business. What’s awesome, though, is that they embraced that and the family realized what was going on.

Painfully sung Christmas carols, check. Oh my goodness, I had to mute it, it hurt so bad. It was intentional so don’t feel bad.

Overbearing family that means well and are all pretty nice, check.

Overheard conversations, check.

Multiple marriage proposals, check.

4/5

Married by Christmas (2016)

Married by Christmas (2016)

Director:

Letia Clouston

Starting:

April Bowlby

Jes Macallan

James Eckhouse

Plot:

A high level executive must find herself a husband before Christmas in order to inherit a fortune.

Review:

So talk about a lovely setup. Grandmother is sexist and doesn’t believe women should run companies so she writes it into the will that once one of her granddaughters marries their husband will own the family company. Our lead female character, who has dedicated the past seven years to the company, is not the one getting married first, instead her flighty, pretentious sister is marrying an organic farmer with some ideas.

I liked that our female lead loved Christmas and family but was just focused on her career. I did think her parents and sister were stupid. I liked that it didn’t end with her getting married or even falling in love, the possibility was just there. Everything was resolved but there was actually room for a sequel if they wanted to do that.

Phenomenal sugar cookies, check.

Boyfriend that turns out to be gay, check.

Unexpected resolution, check.

The movie had a lot going for it, but the pacing was really off. It sped up some things and dragged at others enough for me to knock it down a star.

3/5

My Santa (2013)

My Santa (2013)

Director:

Sam Irvin

Starring:

Samaire Armstrong

Matthew Lawrence

Julie Brown

Plot:

Single mom Jen Robbins, who is a writer of human interest stories for the newspaper in the small town where she has lived all her life, lost the Christmas spirit ever since her ex-husband split.

Review:

So what do we have here, a Christmas movie where the male lead is super young looking. It’s actually kind of weird cause he looks young twenties and the female lead looks early thirties. However, I looked it up and he’s 33 and she is too. Life is really not fair, he should not look that young.

Love triangle, check.

Scrooge, mommy is not in on the Christmas spirit, check.

Jim O’Heir (Jerry from Parks and Rec), I feel like he should be added to the check list because he’s been in a couple so far, check.

Bad acting, check.

Super-fast romance, check.

It was alright, could have done with a bit more. The whole Santa’s kid thing was cool, but the main focus wasn’t that, it was the mom regaining the joy of Christmas, they did a good job with that though.

3/5

Naughty and Nice (2014)

Naughty and Nice (2014)

Director:

Sam Irvin

Starring:

Haylie Duff

Tilky Jones

Maureen McCormick

Plot:

A cynical radio host is banished to Colorado, where he has an on-air spat with a hopeless romantic. Soon, their antagonistic relationship sparks the interest of the whole town.

Review:

Now this is more like it. After the stinker yesterday I’m glad I was able to find one more in line with what I wanted. Meaning there was actually a story and talking and it wasn’t just music playing while they did stuff. This also proves that Haylie Duff was not the issue with the last movie.

Alright, so what did we have?

A “bad boy” that just needed a good woman to turn him around, check.

A recently deceased parent, check.

A love triangle, kind of check. There was another dude in the picture, but he was so clearly a fall back that even he knew it and didn’t seem that upset not to get the girl. I kind of want him to have a spin off movie because he was nice.

So Pepper, Tilky Jones, did this things twice where he would scoot close to Haylie Duff and I don’t know why but it was so sweet and romantic. He was close to her, but not touching her, I don’t know why I noticed it but it stood out. Maybe because I didn’t feel like their relationship, the first time he did it, was at that point, but I don’t know I thought it was kind of romantic. His complete focus was on her but he wasn’t forcing himself on her.

Anyway, cute movie, it washed the taste of the last one out of my brain.

4/5

Christmas Belle (2013)

Christmas Belle (2013)

Director:

Alex Wright

Starring:

Haylie Duff

Nicholas Gonzalez

Mark Famiglietti

Plot:

With her California hometown in the rear-view mirror, Belle heads north on business to facilitate the estate sale of a mansion.

Review:

I was only able to get through two thirds of this movie before I had to bail. It was not good. Most of it was just shots of them doing things with instrumental music playing in the background. We watched the male lead run without his shirt on a lot and the female lead pretend to type on her laptop. It was so bad. There was almost no dialog and what was there was bad too. Do not recommend.

1/5