The Truth About Christmas

As cringy Christmas movies go, this title, The Truth About Christmas, follows the Santa suit. The premise of this movie, enlists the charm of Jillian, played by Kali Hawk, as the whimsical, progressive, and intelligent protagonist to propel the narrative of being honest with yourself. As a political consultant for the upcoming New York mayoral election, Jillian has fallen into the trap of spinning stories for her boyfriend George, which have now turned into full on lies, even to a young girl with the last "IT" toy of the season, the "poppy dot." After procuring the toy from the little girl, "Gucci" Santa ominously appears and curses Jillian with the inability to lie. Exacerbating this problem, Jillian and George are supposed to visit George's family for Christmas this weekend. Hilarity ensues as the "toxic soup" and creepy owl pictures are Jillian's first impressions with the family. Throughout the film, best friend Zoe, played by Michela Cannon, rings in to advance the plot and "Rudolph" Jilian on this journey to finding her "true" self. Receiving 8 stars out of 10, The Truth About Christmas, is a energetic, comic, and heartfelt family film to be enjoyed with a hot cup of cocoa with lots of marshmallows.

It's a creepy movie and the premise is terrible but at times you have to look at the intention - and the intention appears to be good.

Everyone appreciates a feel-good movie around the holidays. One that incites the Christmas spirit and is reminiscent of past holiday joy. Too bad this never happens. The Truth About Christmas is a "holiday" movie meant to exemplify the importance of honesty. When the lead character Jillian is cursed by "Gucci Santa" after lying to a child, she is forced to confront her true feelings about her environment. Although a good message, it is portrayed horribly wrong. The movie has too many subplots. *womp womp* Wishy-washy romantic tension with other characters, Jillian's sudden love for stand-up, and an undiagnosed bird fetish. These unresolved plot points accompanied by Jillian's random caveman grunts and groans, music from Target commercials, and the sad attempt at incorporating modern lingo makes this movie B to the A to the D. Would not recommend.

In this 2018 Freeform channel Christmas movie Kali Hawk plays Jillian Welles, a young political consultant and girlfriend to city councilman George (Damon Dayoub) who spins white lies to further her boyfriends political career. Jillian, who must undertake some last minute shopping for George, finds herself lying to a little girl so that she can get the "it toy", a talking robotic sphere called a Poppy Dot. "Gucci Santa" becomes fed up with all the lying and curses Jillian to only be able to tell the truth. The bulk of the movie consists of unintentionally cringy interactions between Jillian and George's family who she is meeting for the first time. It tries way too hard to be relatable to younger audiences by injecting millennial slang and laughably bad modern renditions of classic Christmas songs. Throughout the movie there's also this strange romantic tension between Jillian and George's brother Blake (Ali Ghandour) that goes nowhere in the end, with even the movie poster hinting at this love triangle that in reality appears nowhere in the film. The movie also includes unnecessary scenes in attempts to draw extra laughs from the audience but they fall flat, such as one scene where Jillian suddenly becomes a stand up comedian in the local bar and garners more laughs from her audience than the average viewer will let out over the course of the entire movie. In the end the best part of the whole movie is simply the plethora of strange and random noises that Jillian lets out over the course of the film.

What a Christmas surprise. I enjoy watching Christmas movies. With that said, so many of them are cheesy and similar plot lines. Thought this would be one but I can actually watch this one again. Take a chance people, I'm sure you'll enjoy.