I enjoyed this Hallmark Christmas offering. It was fun, original and a little quirky. It was definitely a departure from Hallmark's typical cookie-cutter Christmas movies. The premise was interesting and compelling. What if you had Santa's naughty/nice book, and could use it to expose dirt on anybody in your life that you wanted to get back at? You would have awesome power to not only mete out some well-deserved justice, you would also have the power to inflict a lot of unintended pain, as our heroine Krissy Kringle finds out rather quickly.
I liked how the story made the point that, while everyone has naughty moments in their life, they also have plenty of nice ones too. People need to concentrate on the good in others and not focus on the bad so much. After all, would any of us like to be judged solely on the worst thing we ever did in our lives?
The acting in this movie was mostly good. Hilarie Burton gave us a protagonist who was likable, but also a bit flawed and relatable. The dialog was mostly fresh and believable and the story was funny, yet profound at times.
There were a couple of over-the-top cringe scenes, such as when Krissy bursts into the restaurant and tells off her boyfriend Lance about his supposed cheating in front of all his work colleagues, or when she went full-on psycho with the little kid at the department store. Those scenes could have been handled better. I also thought that everyone was way too willing to forgive Krissy for her previous meanness, especially her neighbor Deb and her boyfriend Lance. I really didn't buy him deciding to propose to her at the end. Even if she hadn't been a total jerk to him, why, after 6 years of fence sitting would he suddenly decide to commit? Seems a bit far fetched.
Interesting that they cast Family Ties alums Michael Gross and Meredith Baxter as Krissy's parents. I wonder if that was on purpose, or by accident.
So, except for a couple of rough spots, this was an entertaining, fun Christmas movie that gave us something from Hallmark that was new, fresh and interesting. Definitely worth a watch.
I liked how the story made the point that, while everyone has naughty moments in their life, they also have plenty of nice ones too. People need to concentrate on the good in others and not focus on the bad so much. After all, would any of us like to be judged solely on the worst thing we ever did in our lives?
The acting in this movie was mostly good. Hilarie Burton gave us a protagonist who was likable, but also a bit flawed and relatable. The dialog was mostly fresh and believable and the story was funny, yet profound at times.
There were a couple of over-the-top cringe scenes, such as when Krissy bursts into the restaurant and tells off her boyfriend Lance about his supposed cheating in front of all his work colleagues, or when she went full-on psycho with the little kid at the department store. Those scenes could have been handled better. I also thought that everyone was way too willing to forgive Krissy for her previous meanness, especially her neighbor Deb and her boyfriend Lance. I really didn't buy him deciding to propose to her at the end. Even if she hadn't been a total jerk to him, why, after 6 years of fence sitting would he suddenly decide to commit? Seems a bit far fetched.
Interesting that they cast Family Ties alums Michael Gross and Meredith Baxter as Krissy's parents. I wonder if that was on purpose, or by accident.
So, except for a couple of rough spots, this was an entertaining, fun Christmas movie that gave us something from Hallmark that was new, fresh and interesting. Definitely worth a watch.