Magic In Mistletoe | 2023 Christmas Movies

Magic In Mistletoe, eh? How much magic do we think will be in this movie? I’m betting none.

Harrington (Paul Campbell) writes a series of books titled “Magic In Mistletoe.” When he goes on social media to say Christmas is only about money, his fans start to revolt. It’s up to April (Lyndie Greenwood), a publicist for his publisher, to save his reputation and get his fans to buy his newest book.

Most of the time, this was a pretty cute movie. I liked the way they integrated events involving the book - a costume dance, a lot of Q&As, etc. I wish the movie focused on that more than Harrington being an idiot. The movie goes with the usual trope of dead parents but, if I understood the timeline correctly, his parents have been dead for 9 years (his father) and 5 years (his mother). Yet the movie acts like they died recently. He literally throws a fit because April gets him a (decorated!) Christmas tree. This movie really should have been just about the book.

Rating: I wish this movie was more magical

Candy Cane Lane | 2023 Christmas Movies

Next up is Candy Cane Lane from Amazon Prime Video. With a rather boring title, who knows what this is about.

Every year, Chris (Eddie Murphy) tries to make his homemade Christmas display beat his neighbor’s inflatable display in the neighborhood decoration contest. To upgrade his display this year, he buys a 12 Days of Christmas tree from an elf named Pepper (Jillian Bell). But when he signs his credit card slip, he unknowingly makes a pact that brings the 12 Days to life. Now he must gather all of the golden rings or he will be turned into a figurine for her store.

The “try to outdo Christmas decorations” is a tired plotline. We’ve seen it a lot. However, the twist of bringing the 12 Days of Christmas to life and having to gather all of the golden rings was a nice change. I also really liked the way they portrayed the days. The fight at the high school track was pretty awesome.

I didn’t find myself liking Chris or his wife, Carol (Tracee Ellis Ross), very much. They kept nagging their children to do things they want to do. “Go to the college we want you to attend” and “Don’t be interested in music, even though you are in the marching band and we have obviously spent a lot of money on instrument lessons.” Unfortunately, this means that I didn’t really care if he turned into a figure. I wanted the current figures to be turned back into humans more than I wanted Chris to save himself. The side characters really were the highlight of the movie.

Rating: Can I live with the figures?

To All A Good Night | 2023 Christmas Movies

I’m pretty sure that the Hallmark Movies & Mysteries channel is where they are sticking all of their schmaltzy movies nowadays. I think that Hallmark, as a brand, is trying to be more inclusive and movies like To All A Good Night don’t fit in any more. To be honest, I love that the main Hallmark Channel is getting the better movies. It makes it a little easier on my brain when I know when to expect the saccharine.

Ceci (Kimberley Sustad) is a photographer in a small town. She teaches photography classes for kids, takes pictures for the newspaper, and runs her own portrait studio. When she saves of the life of Sam (Mark Ghanimé) after a motorcycle accident, she has to find out if he has come to down to buy and develop the land she owns with her stepmother or if he has other reasons to come to town.

This movie was so slow. Literally half of the movie was spent with Sam in the hospital while Ceci and intrepid reporter Penny (Luisa d’Oliveira) trying to both hide the fact that Ceci is the one that saved him and figure out why he is there. I really hate when the plots of movies can be solved just by asking a question. If Ceci had just said, from the beginning, “Hey, I’m the one that saved you. What brings you into town?” A lot would have been resolved. Granted, when she did ask him, he dodged the question a little bit but she was never honest with him so why would he be honest with her. Really…the best part of this movie was the dog. I want the dog to have his own movie where he runs around stealing things from the neighbors. It would probably be more interesting.

Rating: I said Good Night!

The Jingle Bell Jubilee | 2023 Christmas Movies

I don’t think I have extremely high standards for Christmas movies. The titles should, at minimum, have something to do with the plot of the movie. The Jingle Bell Jubilee just barely fits. I’ll talk more about that in a bit.

Nate (Marshall Williams) is the new city manager of his childhood hometown. He gets thrown into planning the town’s Christmas festival at the last minute. When there isn’t a charity donation set up, he turns to teacher Hope (Erin Agostino), who runs an annual Regiftmas at her school, for help.

So, yes, the movie is a little bit about Nate planning this Jingle Bell Jubilee thing. However, it’s really not. It’s really about Hope and her grandmother and “the true meaning of Christmas” and regifting things you don’t want to those less fortunate. Hope literally tells the story of her grandmother and her cedar trunk three separate times. (Thankfully, Great American Family has commercials so we don’t have to sit through the story.) Once that is set up in the plot, everything else revolves around Regiftmas. Which, by the way, should really have a better name.

Also, this is the second Christmas movie this season with Agostino. I’m really not fond of her acting. She seems to rely on her giant eyes to do most of the emoting. I think she has another movie in 2023. I’m not looking forward to it.

Rating: The hockey player deserved better

Christmas With A Kiss | 2023 Christmas Movies

Christmas With A Kiss is from Hallmark’s Mahogany line of movies. While I am not the target audience for the Mahogany line, sometimes they are my favorite movies of the season.

Mona (Mishael Morgan) is a social media influencer living in New York City. She comes home for Christmas to help her family run their annual Christmas Carnival. During the 10-day festival, she reconnects with her high school boyfriend, Fletcher (Jaime M. Callica), and meets Dez (Ronnie Rowe), a journalist writing an article about the Carnival.

I had some mixed feelings about this movie. On one hand, the romance was a nice, slow burn. I like when the romantic feelings take awhile to settle in because when they fall in love immediately, it is a little creepy. On the other hand, those of us that watch Hallmark romance movies know that Dez was set up as The One - either despite the fact that they didn’t get along or as a result of it, I’m not sure. And, to be honest, Dez kinda sucks. Sure, he had some nice “family guy” things going on but he also insulted everything that he didn’t agree with. He needed a good kick in the butt before getting into a relationship with anyone. Granted, Fletcher didn’t deserve to be with her either. I wish there was a third, better option for Mona.

Rating: Not as fun as a carnival

Mistletoe Match | 2023 Christmas Movies

Mistletoe Match does have a tired premise. It did start out pretty well but then it fell flat on its face.

Olivia (Elena Juatco) is an investigative reporter who gets tasked to do a deep dive into Mistletoe Match, an annual singles event that claims a 90% success rate. She meets Thomas (Ryan Bruce), an artist that works at the local community center. Will the program work for them or will Olivia expose it as a sham?

When both Olivia and Thomas were on the “this thing sucks, let’s team up” train, it wasn’t a particularly innovative take on the plot but Juatco and Bruce made it interesting. It wasn’t until the plot started to focus on getting funding for the community center over the actual tasks/events at the Mistletoe Match that it started to fall apart. I don’t think they really needed a “what’s in it for him” take. They could have just had the two of them falling in love while doing things they both claimed were stupid. Then the B-plot would still be Thomas’ best friend/coworker Alfie (Vas Saranga) trying to get his act together to propose to his girlfriend, Mia (Dianne Aguilar). Bring in the part about Thomas’s daughter, Erin (Tessa Kozma), needing to write a story for a class assignment and we’re good. We don’t need the community center in dire financial need in order to make the relationship worth something to Thomas. It just muddies the water.

Rating: Not enough matching

Christmas On Windmill Way | 2023 Christmas Movies

A lot of people joke about Hallmark Christmas movie tropes. Great American Family’s Christmas On Windmill Way had to have been written by someone who had a trope checklist and wanted to jam as many as possible into one movie.

The windmill on Windmill Way has been owned by Mia’s (Christa Taylor Brown) family for generations. Due to financial difficulties, her grandmother, Ann (Marcia Bennett), has sold the property to a developer. Mia’s high school boyfriend, Brady (Chad Michael Murray), has been sent by the developer to prepare the property for development.

This is, quite seriously, one of the worst movies I have ever watched. Brown reads her lines like she’s reading greeting cards. Is she capable of putting any emotion behind her words? She’s a new actress on the scene but she really needs to up her game if she plans on being around for very long. Meanwhile, Murray’s job is just to stand there and keep saying the same things over and over again. If we cut out all of the repetitive lines he has, this movie could have probably been a half hour long. It’s movies like this that make me sorry I decided to keep Great American Family on the lineup this year.

Rating: Tear it all down

A Not So Royal Christmas | 2023 Christmas Movies

I…don’t really have an introduction for this one. Onto the review for A Not So Royal Christmas!

Charlotte (Brooke D’Orsay) currently works for a royal gossip website. In an attempt to get herself a raise, she plans to get an interview with the reclusive Count. To ward her off, the royal family convinces one of their groundskeepers, Adam (Will Kemp), pretend to be the Count.

There were things I liked about this movie and things I hated about it. Kemp was charming and delightful. Meanwhile, D’Orsay has this tendency to play annoying characters and this one isn’t any different. I liked the idea of a gossip tabloid chasing the royal but A Christmas Prince did it better. And why is everyone mad at the other person lying to them when they also lied?

This isn’t the worst movie I’ve watched. It’s not even the worst Brooke D’Orsay movie I’ve watched. But I guess if you like royal movies, you might like it.

Rating: So anyone can be Count?

Ladies Of The '80s: A Divas Christmas | 2023 Christmas Movies

Ladies Of The ‘80s: A Divas Christmas may have been the most embarrassing thing I have ever watched. I’m not even sure the target demographic would want to watch this.

Five soap stars from the 1980s - Margaux (Morgan Fairchild), Lily (Loni Anderson), Lauren (Linda Gray), Dana (Donna Mills), and Juliette (Nicolette Sheridan) - come together to film the final Christmas episode of their long-running soap opera. While they repair their broken friendships, they also try to mend the rift between their director Nell (Taylor Ann Thompson) and their producer Alex (Travis Burns).

If you don’t know who any of these women are, this movie will mean nothing to do. It is entirely intended as nostalgia for anyone who watched Dallas, Knots Landing, WKRP in Cincinnati, or Falcon Crest. I bet some of you have never even heard of those shows. It’s old people television. And, sadly, unless you have experience with those shows, you won’t get some of the references in this movie. For example, all of the characters here have the same last name as their previous characters. This might have worked if the writers weren’t banking so hard on audience familiarity. After all, these women are good actresses. There’s a reason they were so popular in the 80s. However, you can’t rely on people in 2023 knowing or caring who they are.

Rating: Wash it down the drain

My Norwegian Holiday | 2023 Christmas Movies

Hallmark really is traveling the world this year. We had A Heidelberg Holiday in Germany, A Merry Scottish Christmas in Scotland, and Christmas In Notting Hill in England. Now Hallmark takes us to Norway with My Norwegian Holiday.

While grading papers in a coffeehouse, JJ (Rhiannon Fish) happens to overhear a breakup between a woman who shares her name - Jessica Johnson - and a Norwegian man named Henrik (David Elsendoorn), leaving the man with an extra plane ticket back home to Norway. He offers JJ the ticket, who eventually agrees, so she can find out more about her recently deceased grandmother. What JJ finds in Bergen is more than she expected.

Yay! We finally have another sweet movie from Hallmark. I love that they didn’t press the romance too much. Instead, the story is driven by JJ trying to find where her grandmother got this handmade troll figure and Henrik’s family teaching her what life is like in Norway. Sure, there are a few scenes that are stupidly played up for the conflict but those are easily overlooked. Instead, we can enjoy time with a fun and loving family in a new country.

Rating: I’ll stay in grandmother’s extra room!