A Hollywood Christmas

I enjoy a cheesy bad Christmas movie, but this one went too far with force-feeding you the "formula." I think if the writers took out the role of the PA spelling out the analogy between the Director's real-life interactions and the happy-ending Christmas movies then it could have really saved the movie. I hate it when scripts are too on-the-nose and GOD that assistants voice was annoying which only made it more excruciating. I think in any real life scenario, if someone behaved like that regarding another persons love life it would have immediately shut down any chance of romance. The second-hand embarrassment I got from her pointing out the chemistry in an unnatural way was out of control. I didn't hate the acting, which is typically the issue with these types of movies, but I couldn't get past how much they shoved the plot in your face. Let me live in the fantasy that the characters have no idea they will have their predictable happily ever after.

As someone who has watched dozens of these Hallmark Christmas movies (ok, been in the same room while the wife has watched them), I thought this idea had promise; unfortunately this movie just didn't deliver. The writing was flat, and the acting wasn't any better. Honestly, this should have been on the Hallmark Channel. For HBO to release this seems hard to believe. The lead actors seemed wildly miscast. The character of Reena, who played the perpetually optimistic sidekick, was about the only good thing about the movie. I was honestly disappointed to see the always fun to watch Missy Pyle in this. This could have, and should have been much better.

This was a Christmas movie around the making of a Christmas movie, which was a clever way to both make fun of the trope and explain why we need it (aka why people like it).

It tells the story of a female director who is directing a Christmas movie and gets caught up in her own Christmas movie as a financial guy shows up from the studio telling her that the Christmas movie division is being shut down and then that they have to cut their budget on this...the last Christmas movie for the studio. The first person to realize that Jessica was in the middle of her own version of a Christmas movie is her assistant Reena (played by Anissa Borrego), who is a real scene stealer.

The two actors playing the lead characters in the movie Jessica is directing where fantasticly over the top...almost cliched version of b-movie actors, but my favorite character was the completely nutty dog trainer and handler (maybe I appreciated that because I know some really nutty dog breeders).

The real story is the romance between Jessica and the studio's finance guy Christopher (Jessika Van and Josh Swickard), these two were just the right amount of sweet and played off each other well.

I enjoyed this more than I expected to and recommend it to Christmas movie fans and romance fans everywhere.

Christmas in the summer. You can enjoy 2 different Christamas movies in a shot. A bit childish to be honest, but totally agree to the protagonist's line that Christmas was her safe space. That she does this because had chosen the job, not just because it was her next step on "wherever my skills take me" unexpectedly inspired me, the quote I needed just at the right time. A few lines survived... but it still has a 90 minutes worth of Christmas vibe we love!

P. S. But I guarantee this could be done much better than this... maybe the budget cut in the movie is a metaphor of the movie itself...? Maybe or maybe not.

This movie is awful! The actors are terrible. I'm looking forward to Hollywood getting their act together ... there needs to be better writing at least. And less annoying characters and less corny acting and noises, the squeaky sidekick was the most annoying a awful character but they were all pretty bad. It felt like a hallmark lifetime corny movie. Why would you think this is good enough for the big screen!!?? Cmon, where are the next Scorsese!? I don't see any around in this generation. So sad. These people need to go back to school. I'm very disappointed at this movie and the time I took to watch it, be warned it was not good.