Sling TV is offering a free view of Great American Family, which is showing all Christmas movies these days. Now they are showing "My Christmas Hero," which stars Candace Cameron Bure ("CCB") as an orthopedic physician based in Lacey, Washington, home of I Corps and the 62d Airlift Wing. According to the Internet, she is "on an mission to honor a special fallen soldier and bring much needed healing to her own family."
I was watching with the sound turned off, so I just realized that the person who I thought was CCB's husband is actually her boyfriend. She's all depressed because he's a military guy and he's being transferred somewhere else.
Anyway, now her mom is talking to the boyfriend and trying to convince him that love should conquer all. What will happen?
Now the boyfriend is talking to CCB: he's not taking the transfer! "I've been searching for you my entire life. . . . We deserve a chance."
ReplyDeleteOh, I am so here for this post.
DeleteSo it looks like that's going to work out. This movie has a rating of 6.8 on IMDB, which is relatively high for this type of show. Of course, CCB is pretty much the Katherine Hepburn of Christmas Romance.
ReplyDeleteI looked up who this person is, and, of course, I recognize CCB--mostly from her child-acting days.
DeleteI watched a bunch of these holiday romances last year, and the best one I saw was "Hanukkah on Rye," starring Jeremy Jordan and Yael Grobglas. It has a 7.4 rating on IMDB, and was genuinely entertaining.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I'll have these running in the background for the next week or so, and any thoughts will go in the comments.
ReplyDeleteMerry Christmas! MEEERRRRRRRRRY CHRISTMAS!!!
DeleteAs far as I can tell on IMDB, the actress playing CCB's mom is about 14 years older than CCB. That's pretty common in these shows. The actress playing the main heroine tends to be somewhere between the ages of 35 and 50, and then anyone over 55 plays a "mom."
ReplyDeleteI've had two people call me "handsome" in the last 48 hours. Both of these people are women family members who see me only occasionally, and they both said it in the same tone with which one might tell someone else that a mutually known 95-year-old "looks great" and "seems to be doing really well."
DeleteThey used to make romances starring actresses in their 20's, but these movies don't work that way. I feel like I would understand a lot more about American culture if I knew why.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, one of the best things about these movies is that everyone gets to wear beautiful coats. We're in the last scene here, and CCB's mom is wearing a great purple coat. CCB has a dark green coat which isn't so spectacular, but then she's got a big white scarf. Anyway, that all worked out and everyone is happy.
ReplyDeleteNext up: "Christmas on Windmill Way." We don't mess around -- we just go straight into the next movie.
ReplyDelete"Christmas on Windmill Way" gets a 6.1 on IMDB, so this is going to be a step down.
ReplyDeleteOur heroine here is played by Taylor Brown, who The Movie Database describes as "a Canadian model, film and television actress who also works as a stand in for actresses in screen productions."
ReplyDeleteAnyway, Taylor Brown's character is "Mia Meijer." According to the Great American Family web page, Mia "excitedly anticipates the town's Christmas Market Dutch bake-off competition and is filled with confidence that her Oma, Ann, will win the top "Golden Rolling Pin" prize. But it turns out that Ann "had to sell the land deed to their Windmill Way property that had been in their family for generations." Furthermore, the guy who will develop the property is Mia's former boyfriend, Brady Schaltz. And Brady is going to tell them that the family's heritage Dutch sawmill, "renowned for the past 90 years for its fine millwork and beautiful wooden furniture, will be torn down to put up a luxurious resort."
ReplyDeleteApparently an "Oma" is a grandmother.
DeleteOK, well, I'm happy for the townspeople because it sounds like that luxurious resort will create a lot of new jobs.
ReplyDeleteAlso, we don't see a lot of movies about the Dutch community in America, or Canada, or wherever this movie is supposed to be set. So far, it's cold and everyone's dressed like they're in Michigan -- except for the ex-boyfriend, who's wearing a dark suit with a dark plaid scarf. He's also got sort of a Simon Le Bon hairstyle going, which is an interesting look for an East Coast businessman.
ReplyDeleteActually, the most interesting thing about the ex-boyfriend is that he's got a huge camera from the 1980's, with one of those big leather straps that people used when they wore cameras around their necks, and he's taking pictures with it. Does anyone under 50 have a camera like that anymore? Where do they get the pictures developed?
ReplyDeleteThe other night, we sat down our daughter, about a month away from her 15th birthday, and talked with her about Fotomats.
DeleteI think one of the most interesting things about these movies is that everyone is a small businessperson. No one ever works for the government, or has a blue collar job, or is even an accountant. They almost always have something like a little restaurant, or a small bookstore, or a bakery. Anyway, now we've reached the stage where the ex-boyfriend is having to tell Taylor that his bosses plan to tear down the sawmill. She's enraged, and he's very sad about the whole thing, but his hands are tied.
ReplyDeleteWell, I don't have much to offer on the question about American culture in relation to romance movies today featuring protagonists in their 30s instead of their 20s, but I think I have a pretty strong guess on the largely self-contained boutique businesses delivering immediate-payoff products like cookies or page-a-day calendars or coffees with whipped cream. My guess here is that most of these movies are being written by aging corporate-comms contractors in the 20-minute gaps that they find themselves waiting on clients to get on Zoom calls or in the afternoons that they hate themselves for not being able to write basically the same paragraph that they've written in an hour every other time they've written it in the last 25 years.
DeleteHere's why this movie gets a 6.1 -- the ex-boyfriend just doesn't seem like a strong enough character. He's sort of a poor man's Willem Defoe, and his character veers between smugness and mournfulness. Come on, man! Do something! Don't just expect us to feel bad for you because you're going to get a big end of the year bonus for tearing down a sawmill.
ReplyDeleteNow we're at the stage where Taylor and her Oma are holding a "sign the petition to save the windmill" event. Taylor is doing an interview with the local news. I feel like this are exactly the type of people who prevented Paducah from getting a decent mall before 1982. WHAT ABOUT ALL THE PEOPLE WHO COULD WORK AT THE LUXURIOUS RESORT?
ReplyDeleteI was in Kentucky Oaks Mall two weeks ago, and it was glorious.
DeleteAccording to the Internet, this movie was filmed in North Bay, Ontario.
ReplyDeleteI still have the sound turned down, but this is the stage of the movie where something goes wrong, and it looks like the ex-boyfriend just got bad news on his cell phone.
ReplyDeleteIt was bad news. The demolition of the mill is set for next week. But he insists that "We can still save this place." What will happen?
ReplyDeleteOK, we're getting to the end here -- Taylor is having a tear-stained conversation with her friend? Sister? Cousin? I don't know -- whoever is her closest female supporter. For the end of the movie, Taylor has a red jacket with a white scarf, and what appears to be a pin with a cardinal and a wreath. Meanwhile, while the rest of the town celebrates Christmas, the ex-boyfriend is having a serious meeting with some high-powered business types.
ReplyDeleteThe business types look skeptical about the ex-boyfriend's plan to build the luxurious resort in Muskegon instead of Windmill Way. But wait! Oma has given some type of official paper to Taylor, and she has now shown up with this paper at the meeting! The businessmen look nonplussed, but Taylor insists that they look at the paper.
ReplyDeleteI once happened to be watching a Today episode when Al Roker was just getting rolling. It was when they were doing the thing where Al Roker talks with the tourists standing outside NBC. They might not do that any more, but they used to. Anyway, there's some Oma holding some sort of sign, and Al Roker engaged her, extending the microphone to her face for a response. This woman quickly put her sign under one arm and put both hands around that microphone, and Al Roker ultimately had to pull it back from her with force while, of course, maintaining a pleasant face. I had the sound turned down, so I never knew what the woman felt was so important to take over the NBC airwaves momentarily. But I remember being so happy for her that she apparently took her shot.
DeleteThe ex-boyfriend's boss still looks skeptical, but the other guy -- the bald guy -- is clearly the most powerful person in the room, and he looks like the ex-boyfriend is the sort of person he can do business with. Now the ex-boyfriend and his boss are shaking hands, and everyone seems happy. Looks like all those jobs are going to Muskegon.
ReplyDeleteSo Taylor and the ex-boyfriend are dancing, and everything seems to have worked out. It's kind of an amazing concept for a movie: "I love you and I will marry you -- but only if you save my family's old sawmill."
ReplyDeleteOK, now we have "'Twas the Text Before Christmas." This one begins in the snow in what appears to be New York.
ReplyDeleteThe IMDB rating for this one is 7.1, which is like being an Oscar nominee in this universe.
ReplyDeleteOur heroine is Addie, a NYC chiropractor played by Merritt Patterson. Patterson is another Canadian actress who starred in 11 Hallmark Channel and Great American Family movies between 2017 and 2021. So she knows what she's doing.
ReplyDeleteHere's the setup: Addie mistakenly receives a text from "Nana." The accidental textt turns into a loving friendship between the matronly Nana and Addie. Nana invites Addie to spend Christmas in Vermont, where Addie meets James -- Nana's single son. He's a traveling doctor who is also home for the holidays. According to Great American Family, "Over three consecutive years, James and Addie are together during the holidays, though it isn't until they are both single that they begin to see each other in a different light."
ReplyDeleteAnyway, we've gotten to the point with the accidental text.
ReplyDeleteOK, I've got a problem already. Nana is calling from a 571 area code, but that's Northern Virginia, not Vermont. Now I have to pretend that Nana is a retired lobbyist who moved up to her country house in Vermont for good once DC was hit by COVID.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, this could explain why Nana is so persuasive.
DeleteThis movie was filmed mainly in Ottawa, Ontario.
ReplyDeleteI love Ottawa.
DeleteOK, we're on year one. Addie has shown up out of the blue, which surprises the rest of the family other than Nana. But James -- the single son -- has a girlfriend. She's meant to be weird and flaky, and she talks over everyone else.
ReplyDeleteOK, now it's year two. Addie now has a boyfriend, but he had enough sense not to come up to Nana's for Christmas. James has now broken up with his girlfriend, who was apparently named "Victoria." James and Addie are washing up the dishes, and James says that he's never been in love. Oh, wait, now he's got a sore back, so she's going to have to use her chiropractor skills -- and then the whole family walks in on them. Everyone's embarrassed. Ah, Christmas.
ReplyDeleteSo Nana has a daughter, and the daughter and her family are also at all these Christmas gatherings. My favorite character in the show so far is Nana's daughter's husband, who does a good job of portraying the inevitable awkwardness of spending Christmas with his wife's family.
ReplyDeleteStill in Year Two, and Addie and James are walking through Nana's hometown -- Hartford, Vermont. Last year, Addie was wearing a green coat with a white scarf. This year, she has a dark blue coat with the same scarf. Things are going great when she gets a call from her boyfriend, "Luc." She doesn't take the call, and keeps talking to James.
ReplyDeleteNow it's on to Year Three. For the record, I don't think Luc ever actually appeared in this movie. I like to think he met up with Victoria.
ReplyDeleteHold the phone. Addie's dad is moving to Australia to live closer to her brother -- and he wants her to move out there as well. Apparently Australia has a need for chiropractors. Who knew?
ReplyDeleteBut all these characters are but putty in Nana's hands, and Nana easily convinces Addie to return for a third Christmas in a row. This year she has a tan coat with a gray and brown scarf. But there is no room for her at her usual inn, so she'll have to stay at Nana's house.
ReplyDeleteThey can't fool me -- there's no way that Inn was booked up. This is just more shenanigans by Nana.
DeleteWhoa, now we have an ad for a drug that deals with bipolar I and II depression. That's fairly intense for a Christmas movie. I have to say, I think the actors in this commercial do a good job of showing us people who appear to be happy, but who also seem like the sort of people who could go off the rails without their medication. That's pretty good acting for a 30 second commercial.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, Addie and James are both single, so everyone is happy this year. But we're at the 90-minute mark, so it's time for something to go wrong.
ReplyDeleteSo far, we've just had a series of what appear to be very dull conversations between Addie and James. Now they're sitting on the front porch drinking coffee. Meanwhile, I can't help but think about Nana's son-in-law, who is probably going to have to miss a Patriots game to make that drive up to Vermont.
ReplyDeleteI'm so thankful that my wife was sent in part to save me from so much Dolphins football in the last 20 years.
DeleteJames had his chance to kiss Addie out there on the front porch, but didn't take it. Does Nana have to do everything? Addie looks disappointed, and we go to commercial.
ReplyDeleteApparently, the whole issue is that James has the chance to go to Jamaica, which is his dream job, and everyone's expecting him to go. Meanwhile, the old guy who owns the inn seizes the day and finally proposes to Nana. James looks nonplussed. There you go, James: you snooze, you lose. We old guys know that.
ReplyDeleteYes, we do (see aforementioned wife of 20 years).
DeleteMeanwhile, Addie has gotten a voice mail from Australia offering her a job. So it looks like James is going to Jamaica, and Addie's going to Australia, and the old guy from the inn will take care of Nana. That seems like a fair outcome for everyone.
ReplyDeleteOK, everyone leaves the house. James and Addie are going to grab coffee in the morning before she goes to the train station.
ReplyDeleteThey have an awkward talk, and say goodbye. Nana's disappointed about the trip to Australia, but what can you do?
ReplyDeleteBut wait? James has just received a package. What is it? We don't know, because when he opens the door again, Addie has reappeared. She tells him that she wants to take a chance on him. And he says that he was going to the train station to stop her. So apparently he's going with her to Australia. But they'll come back every year for Christmas. (Unless there's COVID.)
ReplyDeleteOK, that's all for today.
ReplyDeleteThis post is a blast.
ReplyDeleteThey're currently doing "Aisle Be Home for Christmas," about a woman and her ex-boyfriend who end up trapped together in a Superstore -- it appears to be a Big K, but maybe it's better than that -- all night due to a storm that hits while they're doing their Christmas shopping. It's got an IMDB rating of only 5.1, and it's just not worth discussing further.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I've always wanted to spend all night in a store. Years ago, Borders used to stay open until Midnight on the days when a new Harry Potter book was coming out. At 10 P.M., all the rest of the customers would leave, and the Harry Potter fans would get into a huge line and wait until midnight, when we could finally buy no more than two hard copies, and no more than one audio copy, of the new book. I did that four times, and every time I had a blast.
ReplyDeleteToday, I'm listening to my 2023 Playlist prepared for me by YouTube, based on songs I liked during the year. Right now, I'm listening to "Baby, Let Me Follow You Down," by Bob Dylan, who went on to win the Nobel Prize for Literature.
ReplyDeleteThe Beths, "Expert in a Dying Field"
ReplyDeleteI accidentally posted several comments about the current movie, "Royal Christmas on Ice," in the thread devoted to OVC basketball. So you can go over there if you want to get caught up.
ReplyDeleteBut any other comments regarding "Royal Christmas on Ice" -- a sports themed movie! -- will go here.
DeleteNext up on the 2023 playlist: Elton John, "Where to Now, St. Peter?" Bernie Taupin is one of my heroes.
ReplyDeleteHarry Nilsson, "Gotta Get Up."
ReplyDeleteI missed the rest of "Royal Christmas on Ice," so all I can tell you is that at the end of the movie, the Prince and the heroine skated a duet.
ReplyDeleteNow we have "Christmas in the Smokies," a 2015 film with a 5.8 rating on IMDB.
ReplyDeleteOur heroine is played by Sarah Lancaster, who did a great job as Chuck's sister on the television show "Chuck." I loved that show. Her character is named "Shelby Haygood," and I dare you to come up with a better name for a heroine who lives in the Smokies.
ReplyDeleteShelby's family lives on a farm in the Smokies, and she has an ex-boyfriend named Mason Wyatt, who went off to Nashville and became a big-time singing star.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, the farm is going to be at risk from a developer, and somehow Mason and Shelby are going to work together to save the farm. The whole thing was filmed in Dahlonega in North Georgia.
ReplyDeleteYou could give me two years to come up with a show about the Smokies, and I couldn't come up with names better than Shelby Haygood and Mason Wyatt.
DeleteOn the other hand, check out these names from "Justified":
DeleteRaylan Givens
Boyd Crowder
Ava Crowder
Winona Hawkins
Now those are some high-quality character names.
Georgia could probably play almost every other Southern state. However, I just learned that in the show "Justified," the town of Harlan, Kentucky was played by Green Valley, California.
ReplyDeleteAnother song I played in 2023: Alabama, "Dixieland Delight"
ReplyDeleteThey're having dinner in the Smokies. They seem to have fried chicken, rolls, something that looks like turnip greens, and sweet tea. I can live with that.
ReplyDeleteI also played: Foo Fighters, "Next Year." This was the theme song for the TV show, "Ed," and I really liked that show.
ReplyDeleteI can't really tell what's going on in the Smokies, because the sound is turned down, but Shelby and her mom are having a huge fight with Shelby's dad and Mason. These Southern women seem to get a lot angrier than the women in the other Christmas romance movies. They don't just yell at the men, they also smack them and then storm out of the room.
ReplyDeleteNow Shelby knows that she got too mad, and she's mad at herself for being mad. So her mom comes in there to calm her down. (You could tell all of this even with the sound turned down).
ReplyDeleteFrom the 2023 playlist: Gregg Allman, "Midnight Rider"
ReplyDeleteEven with the sound turned down, you can tell that Sarah Lancaster is a significant upgrade from the typical heroine in these shows.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, the folks on IMDB insist that she lacks chemistry with the guy who plays Mason, and they think the plot is too corny. So that's why it gets a 5.8 rating.
DeleteAnyway, now I'm going to watch the news.
ReplyDeleteFrom the 2023 playlist: Donna Summer, "Heaven Knows"
ReplyDeleteBack to the Smokies. Shelby says, "You always were all hat and no cattle, Mason. So whatever flips your pancake." Mason offers to help raise money to save the farm. Shelby says no. Mason says, "Suit yourself."
ReplyDeleteI may start saying "Whatever flips your pancake."
DeleteBased on that dialogue, I turned the sound back off. Mason has gone into town, and is talking to that table of old men who hang out and have breakfast together.
ReplyDeleteFrom the 2023 playlist: The Band, "Atlantic City"
ReplyDeleteNow Mason has gone to the hospital, and he's singing some songs for little kids. Shelby is there, too, and she's impressed in spite of herself.
ReplyDeleteWell, Shelby was hoping to sell part of the farm to a neighboring farm, but apparently that guy doesn't have the money to help her because their note got called in. So she goes to the bank, and they tell her that they're going to start foreclosure proceedings on January 2. The bank -- Pine Valley Bank -- is owned by the same guy who earlier tried to buy the farm for development.
ReplyDeleteOnce again, I feel sort of bad for the other people in Pine Valley who would have benefited from this development. But presumably there's another town where the farmers don't have a country music star to bail them out, and the development will go there.
DeleteIt's now December 11. So the family is in a crisis. The dad wants to get Mason to help. Shelby says Mason doesn't have that kind of money. The dad says it's not that kind of idea. Shelby comes storming out and tells Mason that her dad wants Mason to do a benefit concert at the farm on Christmas Eve. Mason says, "Of course."
ReplyDelete2023 playlist: Jud Strunk, "A Daisy a Day"
ReplyDelete2023 playlist: Connie Converse, "Talkin' Like You"
ReplyDeleteWell, we've got about 15 minutes left, so Shelby and Mason had a huge fight, and Shelby went storming off in her Ford pickup. I had the sound down, so I have no idea what happened.
ReplyDeleteMason comes back to apologize. "I'm here to stay." Shelby says: "I don't need you, Mason." Mason says, "I know. But I need you. Always have."
ReplyDeleteWell, it may work out for these kids after all.
2023 playlist: Little Big Town, "Little White Church"
ReplyDeleteNow we're almost at the end. There's a big crowd at the farm for the concert, and Shelby is doing an interview with the local radio station. I'm interested in how local media shows up in these movies.
ReplyDeleteThe concert went well, but they didn't raise enough money to pay the note. But then, at the last minute, they get a call from a mysterious benefactor. Someone who owns a chain of grocery stores heard about the concert and is going to put up the money to put their products in her stores. THE FARM IS SAVED!
ReplyDeleteSo the movie ends with Shelby and Mason dancing on the porch, and Shelby wrapping things up with a voiceover:
ReplyDelete"No matter how hard life is, or how much we've messed up, or how broken our lives are, at Christmas good things can come. I believe a baby was born in that manger. I believe in Christmas. I believe in hope."
OK, next up is "Santa, Maybe." 6.3 on IMDB. Can theater director Lila rise to the challenge of putting on the perfect Christmas ballet, while also discovering her office Secret Santa in the process? Lila is played by Aubrey Reynolds, who grew up in Grapevine, Texas and attended B.Y.U.
ReplyDeleteThe featured review on IMDB states that "This movie was a waste of my Saturday night." So I'm not planning to spend a lot of time on this one.
DeleteI will point out that the heroines in these movies often have nieces, but never seem to have nephews.
ReplyDeleteAlso, this movie does have a white collar element. The heroine is a theater director. The hero is the marketing consultant for the theater. So they work in the same office, which is how he becomes her Secret Santa. After watching so many movies about farms, and bakeries, and other small businesses, this is a nice change.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, The Office once did a spectacular episode built around Jim, Pam, and Secret Santa, and there was more drama in five minutes of that episode than anything we're likely to get here. Ultimately, the problem with these movies is that the stakes just aren't very high -- the writers, or the actors, or someone fails to convince you to make the type of emotional investment in these characters that you need to really care how it turns out.
Delete2023 playlist: The Beths, "Future Me Hates Me"
ReplyDeleteWait a minute! They're going to have another movie called "A Royal Christmas Holiday," and the guy playing the Prince in that movie is the same guy who played the Prince in "A Royal Holiday on Ice." That wouldn't work for me at all -- that Prince was already married off to the skater from upstate New York.
ReplyDelete2023 Playlist: Hedwig and the Angry Inch, "The Origin of Love"
ReplyDelete