Aisle Be Home For Christmas | 2022 Christmas Movies

I apologize for my lack of reviews yesterday. I had some holiday festivities that kept me away from my television. No worries, though. All of the Christmas movies will be reviewed. We’re almost at the end! But first, Aisle Be Home For Christmas.

Michelle (Jennifer Freeman) and her ex-boyfriend, Drew (Garrett Watson), get stuck in a superstorm during a major snowstorm on Christmas Eve. Without cell service or internet, they make the best of things with the rest of the stranded people - store owner Angela (Erica Duke), employee Courtney (Jessica Ruth Bell), and shoppers Tristan (John Henry Richardson) and Richie (Ryan Rohtla).

This sounds like a great premise, right? They are stuck in a store with everything the could need or want. There’s food and toys and all sorts of supplies. But everything they do it so boring. They make gingerbread houses but they don’t make it fun. They sit and talk. We don’t actually see them make the houses. We see the houses afterwards but at no point do they actually make the houses themselves. We do get to see Angela spray some whipped cream into some cocoa and Courtney play a guitar but that is about it. BORING.

Do not watch this. I was hoping there were going to be some fun montages of them playing with toys or making pillow forts or something like that. No, they just talk. I hate it. I’m starting to think that maybe the worst Hallmark movie is better than any Great American Family movie.

Crown Prince Of Christmas | 2022 Christmas Movies

This movie, Crown Prince Of Christmas, took so many shortcuts. I actually had to rewind a few times to make sure I saw what I saw.

Madison (Cindy Busby) is a waitress at a hotel in New York City. She is also a singer, though she suffers from terrible stage fright. When her family pressures her into having a date for Christmas, she convinces her best friend and co-worker, Sebastian (Jilon VanOver), to pretend to be her boyfriend. Only her mother and sisters mistake Sebastian for a visiting prince. But maybe they aren’t the ones that are mistaken.

In case you weren’t aware, these Christmas movies are frequently filmed during the summer months. All of the snow is fake and the actors are wearing puffer coats in August heat. To hide this, Crown Prince Of Christmas filmed their outdoor scenes in black and white then colorized the main couple. You can see the leaves on the nearby trees since not all of them are evergreen trees. It was honestly distracting.

There were also some other moments that the ADR was weird. (I talk more about ADR in my review for Merry Textmas.) I think that they left out all of the background noise when the lines were re-recorded so that background noise appears and disappears randomly. It is also distracting.

Sadly, the movie itself wasn’t terrible. If it wasn’t for the awful editing, I would probably recommend checking it out. Unfortunately, they couldn’t bother putting any real money toward the production of the movie and it is obvious. Feel free to check it out if you need a good giggle. Otherwise, leave it alone.

The Art Of Christmas | 2022 Christmas Movies

I have watched a lot of Christmas movies this year. I’m pretty sure that some of these movies weren’t originally written to be Christmas movies. They were written as romance movies (or terrible romcoms) and they stuffed some random Christmas references in to make it fit into the season. Yeah, The Art Of Christmas has little to do with Christmas.

Liv (Brigitte Kingsley) is about to have her first art exhibit. Unfortunately, a fire in the museum’s kitchen has ruined most of her works. In order to make enough money to pay her bills, she takes a job teaching art at a local elementary school. With the help of history teacher, Jake (Joe Towne), Liv finds the inspiration she needs to create more art for her next show.

So this movie was basically “what if two of the most awkward people in the world were shoved together for a relationship?” Jake frequently acts like he’s some sort of alien that doesn’t know how human relationships…even just friendships…work. And Liv hates herself so much that she keeps trying to be someone else. That’s definitely how to get inspired to make artwork that people want to buy.

Don’t watch The Art Of Christmas. It’s annoying. I’m actually getting very close to throwing out the whole Great American channel.

B&B Merry | 2022 Christmas Movies

In B&B Merry, they could not only solve the conflict by having a conversation, they could also solve the conflict by maybe knowing what the job of a travel blogger is. I don’t think I can eyeroll any harder.

Tracey Wise (Jen Lilley) is a luxury travel blogger. Graham (Jesse Hutch) has invited her to review his family’s bed & breakfast in Silver Peak. At the same time, she is asked to review a luxury hotel, also in Silver Peak, as a sample for a possible job. Can she review both without conflicts?

Uuugghhh. First off, Tracey is supposed to be an established travel blogger. Why she is doing any sort of sample writing for anyone? I have been approached for jobs and asked for free writing samples and I point them to this blog (among my other writing gigs). If my writing history isn’t good enough proof of my work, you can go touch grass. I’m not doing free work just because you don’t want to pay me for it. Tracey should know this by now. Especially since she’s also supposedly a lawyer.

Next, Graham invites her to town to review his B&B. But then he gets really mad when she says she has to review the competition as well. THAT IS HER JOB, GRAHAM. She goes places and reviews them. When she brings up the other job, your answer should be “Yeah, that makes sense.” ARGH.

I understand that family owned businesses frequently need word-of-mouth to help them advertise. But you really can’t be like “Only look at my place and forget the other place exists.” You need to show off your place and show her why it’s better than the other place. I mean, maybe that is why your business is failing. It has nothing to do with the other hotel and everything to do with the fact that you literally bad mouth them every chance you get.

While I can’t say that I recommend watching B&B Merry, it’s fine to watch if you can overlook the things I mentioned. The acting is fine, the script is fine. It’s the plot that is kinda annoying. Maybe just half watch it? Is that possible?

Christmas On Candy Cane Lane | 2022 Christmas Movies

Candace Cameron Bure’s Full House/Fuller House co-star, Andrea Barber, has joined her on Great American Family. It’s not particularly surprising since Bure is an executive producer on Christmas On Candy Cane Lane. I wonder how many people Bure is trying to convert to GAF….

Ivy (Andrea Barber) is the daughter of the Christmas maven, Muriel. After Muriel’s death, Ivy struggles to keep up with her mother’s standards.

Why does Great American Family love having movies that do nothing? It wanted to be a comedy. After all, it kept sticking Barber in slapstick situations. But then they wouldn’t let the joke land. They would just whirl off into another moment to try to make it romantic. At the same time, it wanted to be a mystery. Someone is messing with the candy cane decorations across the street. But we can’t focus on that too much because it takes away from the main characters. What we end up with is a movie that has a good premise but is trying to hard to be too many things. It’s almost like the writers had “Yes and” syndrome and didn’t know where to stop.

No, don’t watch this one. Even if you’re going for the “I love Kimmy Gibbler” route, Kimmy got way more jokes than this movie is willing to give. Christmas On Candy Cane Lane isn’t even worth turning on while you do chores. I think this is the first movie from Bure’s production company and it shows. You guys have been in entertainment forever. Do better. Also, I would love to credit more of the cast but they aren’t listed on the IMDb. What is up with that?

A Christmas...Present | 2022 Christmas Movies

Before I even start this review, I want to note that A Christmas…Present is not a Christmas romance movie. This is a religious propaganda movie. I wasn’t planning on addressing the recent comments made by Candace Cameron Bure but, after watching this, her comments are extremely relevant.

Maggie (Candace Cameron Bure) is a busy real estate agent who feels the need to control her entire family’s schedule during the holiday. She takes her family - husband, Eric (Marc Blucas); daughter, Becca (Claire Capek); and son, Will (Caleb Reese Paul) - to Ohio to spend Christmas with her brother, Paul (Paul Fitzgerald); and niece, Ashley (Keilah Davies).

Recently, in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Bure said that Great American Family will focus on “traditional marriage.” We all know this means that they will not feature any member of the LGBTQIA+ community. When I first heard about her statement, I thought “Well, that is a terrible thing to do and a terrible opinion but it was to be expected since that is the reason Bill Abbott left Hallmark for Great American Family.” Then I watched A Christmas…Present where they frequently quoted the bible and even had the “yellow light from above shine through a church window” trope. I wish I was kidding.

In this movie, Paul’s wife died. Maggie and the fam come to Ohio to help him and comfort both him and Ashley. But when Maggie said “It’s tough to do things when you are sad,” Paul pointed out that he is not sad. Let me repeat: HE IS NOT SAD THAT HIS WIFE DIED. Why? Bible verse. This entire movie is painted around “If you have faith, you will be a perfect person and nothing will ever bother you.” Maggie and Eric are having marriage troubles because they keep prioritizing other things over each other. The fix? You got it. Church. What the actual fuck.

Now. I don’t have a problem with religion, per se. Believe what you want to believe. It’s when you feel the need to force your religion onto other people and pretend that you are some righteous being for simply believing in your chosen religion. So instead of Paul being like “Hey, have you guys thought about maybe a marriage counselor to help you through this?” when both Maggie and Eric separately talk to him about their troubles, his reply is….BIBLE VERSES. That is not how you solve marital problems.

I could rant about this movie for a long time. But I will stop here. I’m not going to recommend that anyone watch A Christmas…Present. It had a good core plot - a family that is too busy to spend time with each other tries to find a way back to being a family during the holidays - but then it got super preachy and I don’t think anyone should watch that. This movie not only made me annoyed, it made me angry. Maybe I should go see a therapist about that…

I'm Glad It's Christmas | 2022 Christmas Movies

Hey, it’s another Christmas movie about singers! Maybe I should start a counter for how many movies about singers there are this season. It feels like A LOT.

Holly (Jessica Lowndes) aspires to be on Broadway. One morning, as she was heading into her retail job, she literally bumps into Jason (Paul Greene), who writes jingles for commercials. Through Cora (Gladys Knight), who owns the building that houses the shop where Holly works, the two work together on a new Christmas song for a local talent show…run by Cora.

Thankfully, I’m Glad It’s Christmas has a lot of singing in it because the singing is gorgeous. The script, however, could use some work. For example, Jason shares custody of his daughter, Angela (Teagan Sellers), with his wife. However, Angela is constantly running out of every single scene because her mother is picking her up. There is one whole scene where Holly and Angela are baking cookies but they don’t even get to the baking part. They just roll out the dough then use some glasses to cut shapes. End of scene. If the movie is going to have Angela as a character, she needs to be used. She doesn’t need to be in every scene but she could be leaving to go do homework to hang out with friends or something. The scenario we get makes it look like she never spends time with Jason.

Another example involves Holly’s scarf. In the beginning of the movie, there’s a joke bit about her wearing her scarf over her nose and mouth in order to “protect her voice.” We don’t see her do that at any other point in the movie. She doesn’t even wrap the scarf around her neck. It just hangs loosely as if it is only there for fashion. The least they could have done is kept up with the bit. Maybe have her friends make fun of her for always wrapping her neck up or how unattractive it makes her look. Don’t do it once then leave it go.

Once again, there is nothing special about I’m Glad It’s Christmas. Well, Gladys Knight is a joy. (Wait, I just got that the title of the movie is a pun on her name. That explains why it’s called Someday At Christmas on IMDb.) Watch it for the singing. Watch it for Gladys. Just don’t watch it for the plot. That part is boring.

Christmas At The Drive-In | 2022 Christmas Movies

Danica McKellar is one of the actors that left Hallmark for Great American Family after last year’s Christmas season. Let’s see if the switch changed the tone of the movies she’s doing now.

Sadie (Danica McKellar) is a property lawyer who left her big law firm in Chicago to teach in her hometown. When she hears that her high school boyfriend, Holden (Neal Bledsoe), is selling his late father’s drive-in theater, Sadie takes up the fight to keep the drive-in open.

Well, Christmas At The Drive-In suffers from the same problem as McKellar’s Hallmark movies. She is a wonderful actress stuck with a rather terrible script. For example, all of Sadie’s ideas to save the drive-in consist of “throw more Christmas at it.” I don’t know that putting up more Christmas lights will bring more patrons to the theater. Some of the other ideas were wonderful: the food truck and moving the Christmas tree sales to the drive-in. However, a lot of the ideas revolved around simply adding more decorations.

Thankfully, McKellar was paired with Bledsoe this time around. He’s not the best of the romantic male lead actors but he was able to hold his own against McKellar. Their pairing made Christmas At The Drive-In a little more watchable.

Do I recommend watching it? Eh, if you are a McKellar fan, definitely. She is the bright spot in the movie. Maybe get a bowl of fresh popped popcorn and pretend you are at your own personal drive-in while watching. It might not make it any more interesting but, hey, popcorn!

My Favorite Christmas Tree | 2022 Christmas Movies

A Christmas tree farm and genealogy. Get it? My Favorite Christmas Tree. The green things that we decorate in December and a family tree. So funny. Ha ha.

Kyla (Emma Johnson) is a historical researcher who focuses on genealogy. She travels to Conifer to research a Christmas tree farm run by Joel (Giles Panton) and to figure out some missing pieces of her own family’s history.

My Favorite Christmas Tree is so slow and boring. So much of it relies on doing research and there aren’t too many good ways to make research interesting. I normally love movies that don’t revolve around the romance between the main characters. The problem is that this movie doesn’t do anything to fill that empty space. If you aren’t going to focus on the romance, you have to add something interesting to keep people’s attention. Talking about land history or the genetic makeup of trees is not interesting.

Of course I am saying to stay away from My Favorite Christmas Tree. I’m hoping that Great American Family can come up with some better Christmas movies soon. The Candace Cameron Bure and Danica McKellar movies are on the roster for next week. Hopefully they will be better than the crap we have seen lately.

Christmas In Pine Valley | 2022 Christmas Movies

When I first starting writing these Christmas reviews so long ago, I decided that the MarVisa Entertainment production company was my nemesis. They make a lot of awful Christmas movies. I hadn’t noticed their company logo lately so I thought maybe they gave up. I was wrong. Their movies are still bad but either they aren’t as bad as they used to be or I have grown more tolerant of them. I hope it’s not the latter.

Natalie (Kristina Cole) runs a family Christmas tree farm/home goods store. When she lands a large order from Mr. Prentice (John McKerrow), she is forced to pretend that the company is owned by blood relations or she risks losing the order. In addition, magazine journalist Josh (Andrew Biernat) wants to write an extremely truthful article on the company. Can Natalie and the gang pull off pretending to be a real family instead of a chosen family?

Christmas In Pine Valley is, and I am not kidding about this, the stupidest Christmas movie I have seen this season. Mr. Prentice insists on only buying from family-run companies. He admits that he cancels orders if he finds out the companies are not run by actual family members. Then he places an order for 500(!) pieces of their soap, candles, handmade wooden ornaments, and essential oils. Does he really think a small family-run company has the capacity to make 500 pieces of product in just a few days? Or that their company wouldn’t be completely ruined if he cancelled the order after they already started production? Yet at no point is he made out to be the villain in the story.

In addition, we have stupid Josh. He randomly shows up on their doorstep without calling ahead to schedule a time to talk to the family about his article. Then he follows them around, even after they tell him how busy they are. And he has the gall to tell Natalie that he’ll write a bad article if he finds out that they aren’t a family?

Apparently none of these people know about branding. They straight up say the farm was started in 1937. The people that originally owned that farm would either be very elderly or dead in 2022. Even if they left the farm to their children and those children left the farm to their children, they would need more than only their relatives to run the farm. It’s unreasonable to think that everyone in a company with “Family” in the name are actual blood family members.

Absolutely do not watch Christmas In Pine Valley. As a matter of fact, don’t watch anything from MarVista Entertainment. I think I might boycott them again.