I believe there are two Jodie Sweetin Christmas movies this season. It’s a little unusual for a known actress to be in more than one Christmas movie per year. Perhaps she’s trying to steal the Christmas season from Candace Cameron Bure. Well, let’s see if A Cozy Christmas Inn is any good.
Erika (Jodie Sweetin) is a real estate executive working for Sharon (Vivica A. Fox). Sharon sends Erika to a small town in Alaska to purchase a local inn. When Erika arrives, she finds that the inn is owned by her ex-boyfriend, Andy (David O’Donnell). Will Erika be able to make the offer before she falls in love again?
To be honest, I didn’t expect a lot from A Cozy Christmas Inn. Generally speaking, movies about inns or bed and breakfast places aren’t usually good. For some reason, they spend too much time on the hotel instead of the couple. While the romance shouldn’t be the sole focus of the movie, it should have a leading role.
Surprisingly, this hotel movie was quite good. It balanced Erika’s hesitancy at reconnecting with Andy, giving each of the interesting townspeople a small spotlight, and the actual rekindling of the romance between Erika and Andy very well. Both Erika and Andy had their “I know better than you” moment but neither of those moments were mean about it. Sometimes romance movies make one part of the couple snarky about knowing something more or being better at something than the other person. In this case, Erika cooks Andy a meal and Andy gives Erika a pair of real boots (as opposed to dress boots). There is a little bit of fun ribbing - Erika kinda makes fun of Andy’s diet and Andy kinda makes fun of Erika thinking that dress boots are appropriate for Alaska - but it’s never in a mean way that would make the other person feel bad. It’s moments like this that make them feel like an actual couple.
While there isn’t a ton of Christmas in A Cozy Christmas Inn, this is a really good movie. There is some holiday spirit and a winkwinknudgenudge that says Andy might be Santa’s son. But even if you love tons of Christmas in your Christmas movie, I think you would enjoy this one. I almost want to say it’s the perfect Christmas romance movie. Almost.