You should be here with me, baby please come home
In which there are many flashbacks to Christmases past
A Nashville Christmas Carol
This is not as good as The Muppet Christmas Carol, which we watched the night before, but it’s a lot better than 90% of what Hallmark puts out. The leads have good chemistry and are truly great Hallmark actors. They play the emotions in a believable way, which feels like damning with faint praise. But it was an enjoyable movie to watch, with hardly any groan-worthy dialogue. This was also the first movie I watched with other people, so that might have something to do with why I enjoyed it more.
Our “Scrooge” is Vivienne, the producer of Country Christmas Live, a not-actually live music show filmed in Nashville. She’s “not Scroogey enough,” according to my brother-in-law. She’s a perfectionist who is very exacting with her employees and not super enthusiastic about Christmas, but she’s not Michael Caine throwing a wreath at a cute little bunny muppet. There are some subplots (her sister/assistant is leaving for law school, a bigwig from the network is here to observe her work) but what the Spirits of Christmases Past and Present (and the spirit/ghost of her late boss, played by Wynonna Judd) are here to set Vivienne on a path toward Gavin, with whom she has History.
I spent the first third of this movie thinking that Vivienne and Gavin used to date, but (mild spoiler) they were best friends who never actually dated! So it’s less about rekindling an old flame (which I assumed from the ads and plot description) and more about igniting a flame that never got the chance to light in the first place? The Spirit of Christmas Past gets the most screen time, since he has the job of guiding Vivienne through flashbacks of her friendship with Gavin. He is played by a country singer called Kix Brooks (not his real name) who bigger country fans than I might recognize. I mean, I mainly recognize Wynonna Judd because of Kristen Wiig’s mom in Bridesmaids.
There is not nearly as much singing as I’d expected, but the singers in the movie are played by real country singers, so the singing is at least good. No offense to Vivienne, I was not as into the stage production that went along with the songs. It was weird to see them sing to empty seats (even if the show isn’t live, there’s usually an audience at the recording for these types of things), but I chalk that up to covid making it inadvisable to cram extras into a theater.
Overall, this was a fun movie! If you only watch one adaptation of Dickens, I’d go with the Muppets. But if you want another, much looser, one, this will hit the spot.
FINAL RATING: 5 out of 5 doggy thespians
Is the title a pun? No, it’s just “hey, it’s kind of A Christmas Carol, but in Nashville!”
How many other Hallmark movies have the two leads been in? Jessy Schram: 1 non-seasonal movie (Country at Heart), 1 fall movie (Harvest Moon), 2 winter movies (Amazing Winter Romance, The Birthday Wish), 2 Christmas movies (Road to Christmas, Royal New Year’s Eve)
Wes Brown: 2 Christmas movies (Check Inn to Christmas, Christmas at Graceland), 2 fall movies (Over the Moon in Love, Under the Autumn Moon), 1 non-seasonal movie (Wedding at Graceland)
What does Christmas mean? No one explicitly says it, but Christmas is obviously about second chances.
Last minute plans/impending deadline? The taping of the show is in 6 days!!
Real Santa? No, but there are ghosts! Er, spirits.
How white? The main cast is very white, but the background characters at least appear to reflect that this is in Nashville.
Bingo? Yes!! Bingo at last! I spoke too soon last week about the cocoa monopoly on hot beverages in Hallmark movies — in Nashville they’re all about mulled cider — but it didn’t matter! Bingo!!!
The Christmas House
You’re in for a Treat! The Christmas House stars Treat Williams who is also in Dolly Parton’s Christmas On The Square which premiered the same day on Netflix. What a Treat! I can’t stop making these jokes. Treat yourself to some Treat Williams! Go watch Everwood (all four seasons for free on IMDbTV through Amazon Prime) for even more of a Treat! Sorry Mr. Williams.
Treat Williams plays Bill, the patriarch of the Mitchell family. Bill and his wife Phylis have called their grown sons, Mike and Brandon, home to revive their old “Christmas House” tradition. They don’t make it clear why they stopped, but it’s been 20 years since the Mitchells decorated their house within an inch of its life and invited their neighbors in to enjoy the animatronics and twinkly lights.
Phylis spends so much time standing back from the group looking sad and pensive that I became convinced she was hiding a cancer diagnosis. I thought “this is too dark for Hallmark Christmas” and I was right. But this movie is a little more dramatic than the usual Hallmark fare. There are also a lot of golden-hued flashbacks to Christmases past, which felt like they slowed the story down more than providing context for anything.
Overall, there’s more family drama to balance the wacky holiday hijinks. Brandon and his husband Jake are waiting to hear back about a potential adoption, a process they’ve been through enough times that Brandon is reluctant to tell his family because he doesn’t want to get their hopes up. Also, I was shocked when Brandon and Jake kissed and held each other after a conversation about their adoption. You guys, Hallmark a) does not usually acknowledge that gay people exist and b) basically never shows more than one kiss in the last ten minutes of their movies. And here they have two men kissing half an hour into this movie! I don’t mean to give Hallmark a gold star for the minimum effort, but considering that these movies have never gone beyond a single dry heterosexual kiss this feels huge.
Brandon’s brother Mike gets the central romance of this movie, with the girl next door Andi Cruz. They also get to kiss! Mike is an actor, starring in the cheesy legal drama Handsome Justice. (His character is Clint Handsome, which just makes me think of Alexis Goodlooking from 30 Rock. I wish more Hallmark movies reminded me of 30 Rock.) He and Andi used to do magic shows together, and it’s a very endearingly dorky backstory that gets pulled into the present when Mike begins teaching Andi’s son Noah magic. “Magic is really something to be shared. It’s a lot like Christmas.”
In addition to featuring a gay couple as one of the three main couples in this movie, Hallmark also twists their usual formula with Mike and Andi’s romance. This time, the man is the one returning to his hometown from the big city and the woman is the one negging him and promoting the small-town lifestyle.
In the end, I found myself liking this movie. It took longer than usual to get all the pieces into place at the start of the story, and I think that’s due to the fact that it was balancing three storylines that it wanted to give equal weight. But since it’s a two hour movie with commercial breaks included there’s not quite enough time for everything this movie wanted to be. Still, a nice little Christmas treat.
FINAL RATING: 3.5 out of 5 Grift body sprays
Is the title a pun? A serious lack of puns this weekend. “The Christmas House” is just what they call their house when it’s decorated for Christmas. So literal!
How many other Hallmark movies have the two leads been in? For this, we’ll go with the whole Mitchell family.
Treat Williams: 1 Christmas movie (Rocky Mountain Christmas), 1 non-seasonal movie (Safe Harbor), 2 Hallmark Hall of Fame movies (Beyond the Blackboard, Front of the Class)
Sharon Lawrence: 2 Christmas movies (Merry & Bright, Hearts of Christmas)
Robert Buckley: 1 non-seasonal movie (Love in Store)
Jonathan Bennett: 1 Valentine’s movie (Love at First Glance), 1 Christmas movie (Christmas Made to Order) Also he was in an Ion channel Christmas movie called A Dogwalker’s Christmas Tale which was the WORST TV Christmas movie I have ever seen and not in a fun way.)
What does Christmas mean? “Christmas is about traditions.”
Last minute plans/impending deadline? They have to decorate the entire house in two weeks to get it done for their Christmas Eve party!
Real Santa? No, but one of the characters dresses up as Santa, which hasn’t happened yet this year!
How white? The entire main family is very white (Robert Buckley’s character on iZombie was Major Lilywhite, and that is a very apt name). Andi and her mother are Latina and the families speak Spanglish with each other while they make the traditional Christmas tamales. It feels thoughtful and realistic in a way Hallmark often is not.
Bingo? You would think The Christmas House would be more Christmassy! Boo!
We are heading into Hallmark’s Thanksgiving week marathon, with a premier every night this week. I’ve decided to send newsletters on Thursday and Saturday, so look out for Heart of the Holidays, A Christmas Tree Grows in Colorado, and Good Morning Christmas! (exclamation point Hallmarks, not mine) up next.