As usual, Christmas themed films start cropping up in the schedules and on streaming before the last of the fireworks are let off.
The majority are on Movies 24, renamed Christmas 24 for the season.
There are usually a few good ones amongst the run of the mill, but that has not been the case so far this year.
There is a Christmas deadline looming in The Spirit of Christmas Station, so literary editor Isabell (Alexandra Harris) retreats to her family’s cabin in a quaint town where she spent her holidays as a little girl. Finding the town in a slump, the inspiration she is looking for comes from a local rancher, Dane Woods (Chase Garland) who helps her revive the annual Christmas Festival. By the numbers stuff made worse by a raft of annoying characters.
A perfectionist holiday expert and a free-spirited bookstore owner go head-to-head in a festive bet to prove whose approach to Christmas is best in The Christmas Bookshop. This is passable for a bleak winter afternoon but the budget looks painfully small.
Carrie Williams (Brianna Cohen) runs a Christmas lodge in Saving the Christmas Ranch. When her crooked accountant runs off with all her money, she has two days to come up with nine months of mortgage payments, or she will lose the business. Saving a business at Christmas is a well worn plot, but this is bolstered by a good performance by Cohen.
By far the worst of this crop is A Royal Montana Christmas. Overwhelmed by her royal duties, Princess Victoria (Fiona Gubelmann) visits Montana for Christmas and meets her dashing guide at a ranch. She must decide whether she should leave her royal life for love. These royal movies never work for me and this is full of snooty, unlikeable characters.
Ratings out of 10:
The Spirit of Christmas Station: 4.5
The Christmas Bookshop: 5
Saving the Christmas Ranch: 5
A Royal Montana Christmas: 2
Some of this year’s plethora of Hallmark Christmas movies are cropping up on Sky Movies, for their subscribers delectation.
The stand out is Christmas on Duty that features Blair (Janel Parrish) and Josh (Parker Young) who are stationed in the army together but have never got on. So, when they are both assigned to Christmas duty they plan to stay away from each other, but when a snowstorm prevents all the Christmas presents from being delivered to base, they are forced to team up for a special mission to save Christmas. After a stodgy start, this picks up once the pair are on their mission. Parrish and Young spark off each other nicely but the acting honours go to Peter Jacobson as Blair’s Dad.
In A Newport Christmas, Ella (Ginna Claire Mason) heads out on a boat in 1905 and somehow ends up in 2025, where she meets and falls for Nick (Wes Brown). He has to figure out how to get her back in time and decide if their newfound love can stand the test of it. It is a good job that Ella time travels as the period scenes are ineptly staged and terribly acted. Aside from a few fish-out-of-water moments, there is nothing to stave off the boredom.
Parents, Anne (Laurel Lefkow) and Ben (Nigel Whitmey), buy their three adult children – oldest son, Cal (Brandon Routh), middle son, Dylan (Jonathan Bennett) and daughter, Emory (Eden Sher) – a river cruise down the Danube River in A Keller Christmas Vacation. They are reluctant to go as they live very different lives. I was a fan of Sher in The Middle but she is not as good in Hallmark’s attempt to produce something edgier as it includes a gay couple. However, it does not work, trying to stuff too many plots into 90 minutes.
In Tidings for the Season,a serious TV newscaster’s life changes when he meets his young superfan and the boy’s hardworking single mum. This started out okay, with the TV station making a different setting to the norm. But with the kid involved, it gets too slushy too quickly.
Ratings out of 10:
Christmas on Duty: 6
A Newport Christmas: 3
A Keller Christmas Vacation: 3.5
Tidings for the Season: 4
On My5
If you really are an addict for all things festive, you can watch A Scottish Christmas Secret. A workaholic publisher goes to the Scottish Highlands to convince an author to finish his book series. While posing as a ski student, she discovers he is the heir to a dukedom and they fall in love. Why is it, that when ever these US films venture out to the British Isles, they always have to feature members of the aristocracy living in castles? Chock full of clichés and with the always awful Caprice Bourret in the lead role. Though, Patsy Kensit is almost as bad!
Rating: 2 out of 10
Netflix usually have a few decent offerings but their first effort, Champagne Problems, is very poor. A driven American executive heads to Paris determined to acquire a champagne brand by Christmas and accidentally falls for the heir to the bubbly empire. It is painfully predictable stuff where the two leads spent way too much time grinning at each other inanely.
Rating: 2.5 out of 10
Finally to Amazon Prime and two films of very different quality.
In Tyler Perry’s Finding Joy, Shannon Thornton stars as Joy, a New York fashion designer whose talents are overshadowed by her boss. Just like her career, Joy has been unlucky in love. Encouraged by her steadfast friends Ashley (Brittany S. Hall) and Littia (Inayah), Joy follows her crush Colton (Aaron O’Connell) to Colorado, hoping for holiday magic. Instead, a shocking revelation and a snowstorm leave her stranded. At her lowest, Joy meets Ridge (Tosin Morohunfola), a chance encounter that transforms her perspective on life and love. Burdened with an awful script and little Christmas cheer, this is a chore to watch.
Play Dirty might not be everyone’s idea of a Christmas movie, but as it is written and directed by Shane Black, it is set in the season, so I am including it here! There have been numerous attempts to bring Donald E. Westlake’s professional thief Parker to the screen, most notably in 1967 in Point Blank and in 1973 in The Outfit. This latest adaptation stars Mark Wahlberg as the anti hero. He becomes involved in a major heist where he must outsmart a South American dictator, the New York mob, and the world’s richest man. People are sniffy about Wahlberg, but I think he picks pretty decent material most of the time, and I thoroughly enjoyed this slick crime caper. Black provides a lot of killer lines and a plot that twists nicely without becoming silly. It is also brutal stuff, with a very high body count, with a ruthless Parker responsible for a lot of them. LaKeith Stanfield, Rosa Salazar and Nat Wolff all particularly stand out amongst an impressive cast.
Ratings out of 10:
Tyler Perry’s Finding Joy: 3.5
Play Dirty: 8