Christmas Under the Stars

Hallmark hit a home run with this cast. Not to mention the great story. Reeser has mastered the "struggling single mother" role. I would love to see a sequel and not necessarily a Christmas sequel. That's how good I think the story is.

Liked the cast together. Jesse Metcalf and Autumn Reeser make a compatible looking couple looks wise. She isn't silly looking like some.

The story starts off a bit more interesting than usual. He's been laid off from an investment firm. At least the story doesn't have a completely done to death set up. What's irritating is that she's angry with him for working in finance even though he isn't responsible for her troubles. Unreasonable for sure. Good thing he doesn't have to sacrifice his career for love for a change.

A nice change of story, although it's still the typical boy meets girl. The characters are all likeable and it's not just about the main two.

Jesse Metcalfe is actually quite lovely in this one, a much nicer character than the one he played in "Christmas Next Door".

The falling out she has is a bit daft and out of proportion, but otherwise it flows without issues.

I was expecting a typical Hallmark Christmas romance with all about the 2 leads & their stories. However the glue that holds everything together was the natural excellent performance by Clarke Peters as Clem, who owns a Christmas tree-lot. Autumn Reeser adds another classy believable role as a Mum who has crippling bills to pay from her Dad's medical treatments , being badly treated by finance companies who own the debt. Jesse Metcalf does pretty ok too as a recently-fired Investment expert who finds himself again & gets to give back to others at the best time of the year ! Less typical than most Hallmark seasonal films, and all the better for that !

One of the better Hallmark premieres this year so far. I don't know why other reviewers aren't mentioning Clarke Peters, but he killed it as usual. People pointing out inaccuracies with finance in this movie like there aren't countless inaccuracies in every single Hallmark Christmas movie. A top 3 for Hallmark Xmas in 2019 I am sure of it.