Welcome to the 2019 Christmas season! If you’re new around here, I recap Hallmark Christmas movies. I started doing this to amuse my friends, and that’s pretty much the reason I’m still doing it (and why I use a terrible free WordPress template).
A couple of things to note for the good of the order:
(1) There is way too much freaking content out there. Lifetime is getting in the mix with like 30 new movies now. Netflix is probably preparing to put out 1000. I am but one woman with a full time job and a child who now has the ability to call me out when I’m not paying attention to her. If you’ve been around for the last few years, you know I usually lose steam on this thing by mid-December anyway. I have to put a boundary somewhere, and since Hallmark is basically the O.G. on all of this (and, you know, since I went and put Hallmark in the name of the blog), I’m planning to stick to Hallmark movies. I may make an exception if another provider puts out something so bananas that I can’t ignore it, but it will need to be truly next-level bananas and not just run of the mill “Vanessa Hudgens is a princess and now there’s a knight for some reason?” bananas.
(2) The best comment I ever got on this blog was someone who really did not like how much I disliked a particular movie and accused me of being a bitter failed actress who couldn’t even get a role in a Hallmark movie if I tried. I am technically a failed actress in that I once played a Hot Box dancer in my middle school production of Guys and Dolls but then when my high school inexplicably performed the same play two years later I got demoted to “Chorus” and only got to walk across the stage twice in the background. However, I think it’s important to make clear that I’m not just here to insult these movies. In fact, the whole reason I started watching these movies in the first place is because I genuinely like them. Alan Thicke makes me cry real tears every time. I love watching Meredith Grey’s sister realize that she’s in love with that guy who sleeps in the department store display because he can’t afford a New York apartment. Joey Lawrence is a national treasure. But when you churn out 30 movies a year, they can’t all be winners. I’m really here to help you decide where to spend your time if your schedule only allows you to watch a normal number of Hallmark Christmas movies per year.
OK, now that we have all of that out of the way, let’s kick off the 2019 holiday season
In A Nutshell
Jill Wagner is a former interior decorator named…Jill Wagner? I probably should have written this down (I did write down the male lead’s name, which seems silly looking back on it because of course it is Nick). Jill Wagner has an adorable son (who says things like “Mom, I’m hungry and Grandpa won’t feed me!” which made me guffaw for some reason) and an affable dad who encourages her to follow her dreams. She gave up the high stakes world of interior decorating years ago because her son’s dad is not around for reasons that I don’t think were ever explained. She is now a programming director at a nursing home, which seems like it would be kind of lovely.
One of the board members of the nursing home is a lovely older rich lady who encourages Jill Wagner to come apply for an interior design job with her son Nick Sinclair. He is a Corporate Guy Who Lives In New York City but he has returned to his hometown because his company is going to be “expanding its territory into the Southeast.” Where is this supposed to be taking place? It may just be yet another Hallmark movie where the writers out themselves as Canadians because they do not understand U.S. climates. Anyway, Nick is both living in and working out of his grandfather’s estate, and they want to make it pretty for a gala of some sort. He brought his Senior VP Kate, who is a Corporate Lady Who Lives In New York City And Is Not Swayed By Your Small Town Charm Because She Loves Mergers. Kate is not impressed with Jill Wagner, and it seems clear that she and Nick are just humoring Nick’s mother by giving Jill Wagner an interview at all. Jill Wagner stumbles her way through the interview (kind of surprised that she wouldn’t have a lawn guy at the ready…that felt like a softball question). She yells at Nick and Kate when it becomes clear they are being dismissive. Nick likes her moxie and her gumption. She is hired.
Jill Wagner feels like she needs to involve Nick in a lot of her decision making for some reason. He is reluctant at first because he has a business to run, but then goes to an antique market with her when one of his Important Business Meetings is cancelled. He makes a bad joke while they sip peppermint hot chocolate. Jill Wagner didn’t realize he had a sense of humor, but now that she knows she is into him in a big way. They spend the rest of the movie gazing at each other longingly while doing Christmas-y things.
Are There Obstacles To Their Love/Christmas Spirit?
One of the elderly residents of the nursing home where Jill Wagner worked at the beginning tries to be sneaky and set Jill Wagner up with his grandson (sidebar: it just now occurred to me that Jill Wagner must have quit her job for this one interior design gig, which seems bananas). His grandson is a handsome pediatrician. He’s there to create a love triangle I guess, but he doesn’t really do anything and respectfully bows out when he realizes Jill Wagner is in love with Nick. Oh wait, he does come up with a plan during the gala to make Nick jealous by dancing with Jill Wagner and making her laugh. Nick looks sad over this, so I suppose it worked.
Then we have Kate. Poor, misunderstood Kate. You know I gotta defend my corporate ladies when Hallmark decides to throw them in as villains. Look, you guys, Kate just loves mergers. She loves them in a way Nick never will. Why can’t she just do the thing she loves without having to remind her boss every 3 minutes that he should actually be doing his job instead of doing Christmas-y things with his interior decorator? She called him out for missing the big call with the merger partner (oh yeah, they were doing a merger. Not clear why the business needs a merger to survive when they are also expanding to the Southeast. Maybe put a pin in those expansion plans, chief). But why should she have to cover for her boss while he makes gingerbread houses? Maybe Kate would also enjoy making gingerbread houses, but SOMEONE HAS TO GET THIS MERGER DONE AND IT CLEARLY AIN’T GONNA BE NICK. Yes, she’s being cold to Jill Wagner, but if I were her I’d be like “Why did you drag me down to wherever we are in the Southeast to oversee the restoration of this house WHEN I JUST WANT TO DO MERGERS?!?” Is this in her job description? We needed CCB to executive produce this movie so we could have thrown in a swipe or two at the fact that a woman is being asked to put her actual job on hold to oversee a Christmas gala and tell Jill Wagner what color couch to buy.
So yeah, I’m going with the patriarchy that pitted two female characters against each other unnecessarily is the obstacle. And I used “patriarchy” in the first blog post of the season. 2019 is going to be a banner year.
Ok, so Nick realizes that he’s not really been doing his job and he has to stop leaving in the middle of the day to help Jill Wagner find old boxes in the garage and talk about his dad doing the 12 Days of Christmas for him before he got too busy working all the time. Jill Wagner is sad and thinks they aren’t in love anymore.
But Do They Find The Meaning Of Christmas??
Sure! For you see, Jill Wagner is determined not to miss any Christmas things for her son even while she does this job that she went all in on by presumably quitting her other stable salaried job. They decorate 200 Christmas ornaments in one night, because that seems like a thing that one would ask a child to volunteer for. They make gingerbread houses! There’s a pageant rehearsal that Jill Wagner almost can’t get to because of the snow, but then Nick saves the day and drives her. Boatloads of Christmas spirit here.
Oh, and for some reason they threw in an excellent British event planner for the gala. I do not know what purpose he served in the film’s plot, but I enjoyed that his presence allowed references to be made to figgy pudding.
Also, actual line from my notes — “It has not snowed on Christmas Eve since her mom died? Ok Hallmark”
But Do They Fall In Love At The End?!?!?
You better believe it. I think we tried to do a thing at the end where there was a terrible misunderstanding on Jill Wagner’s part and she thought Kate was proposing marriage to Nick but really Kate was proposing that he get out of her damn way and let her run with the mergers and he can stay and run this ill-advised Southeast expansion or maybe just quit entirely because he clearly doesn’t want to be doing this. That felt like it resolved itself pretty quickly. Then Nick confesses his love to Jill Wagner in front of a decorated gazebo (which he got together very quickly, it seems…) and they kiss and it snows on Christmas Eve. Hooray!
I think Nick looks like a discount version of a young Harrison Ford, and I’m not mad about that. Jill Wagner (you probably know her from when she was the sideline reporter on Wipeout if you’re cool like me, or Teen Wolf if you were cool eight years ago, or from her 800 other Hallmark movies) is a delight. For some reason I feel like she’s got a little more substance to her than some of our other Hallmark heroines. I can’t put my finger on it. I liked this couple and the way they flirted with each other as though they were in middle school. That sounds like an insult, but I mean it as a complement of the highest order. When you can’t kiss until the end of the movie you have to show your chemistry in more chaste ways, and they really rocked it out with the playful arm punches and staring at each other wistfully from across the room.
Should I Watch This Movie?
I expected that this movie was going to be garbage because it was released before Halloween. Like last year, I was pleasantly surprised when it met my admittedly low bar. I don’t know why I thought Jill Wagner wouldd let me down. Worth a watch.
Deck the Hall(mark Movie)s 