A Country Christmas Harmony

Usually love Brooke Elliott but A Country Christmas Harmony feels like it was written in a night, shot in a week and slapped on the air as nothing more than content-filler to run holiday commercials around.

Fun to see Danny Pintauro acting again so many years after Who's The Boss. And love hearing Brooke sing. The rest is a lazy mess, from grandma's (Ann Walker) stilted dialogue and delivery, to the faked angst between between Chrissy and Luke, played by Brandon Quinn, (Elliott's usual co-star in Sweet Magnolias).

Wasn't expecting high art from a Lifetime holiday movie, but this contrived pile of misfire is a big-time waste of a coupla of likable stars.

Good acting, lousy story & script. I think the actors did the best they could with a really boring, nearly nonexistent storyline. I mean, this is really bad. The story was hard to follow, maybe because there was none or maybe because I just didn't care. It didn't draw me in at all. I wonder if it was written in one night on a drunken dare. I almost gave up on it after 1/2 hour, but then stuck with it out of morbid curiosity. No, it never got better or even developed. Kudos to the actors for putting the best face possible on this stinker. I give it 6 stars for the acting, 0 stars for the story/script. C'mon, Lifetime. Step up your game.

Start with the overly used premise intended to give a stage to a popular vocalist or two and then don't give them many chances for live performances. (There are some voiceover songs.) Hit the plotline checklist as many times as you can. Cast two leads with no chemistry and one with little appeal beyond her voice. Have her give an acting performance which just doesn't work probably because she is wrong for this particular part. There is some overacting and some where she just is not convincing. This movie made no connection for me.

The movie starts out with a music video featuring Brooke Elliott where I was eager for more but the voice over songs just didn't come close. Brandon Quinn does a really nice song about 3/4ths through. And then a finale with both of them, but only Elliott's vocals.

Speaking of common plotlines, early on the viewer gets sold on how much Chrissy doesn't want to see Luke and it sounds like she really doesn't like him. But very quickly, too quickly and too abruptly, that disappears and you can see the love rekindling. Then we need a misunderstanding to create the conflict and that is really forced.

I can be happy with a common story if it is done a least decently and it provides a stage for talented musicians, but there just isn't enough pf that and the acting and story were too subpar.

A Country Christmas Harmony (2022) -

Brandon Quinn playing Luke was actually very sexy in this one, with those brilliant eyes and not just because he had a rockin' hot bod too, but I really couldn't see him together with Brooke Elliott as Chrissy. She was wet and annoying before the storm hit town.

He was probably the only reason I got passed the first 20 minutes and stuck with it until the end. I have seen him in other films before, playing side characters,so it was nice to see him in a leading role for a change.

He actually made it seem that Luke was in to Chrissy though, even if their kissing scenes were a bit pathetic.

It could have been sweet with a different leading lady, maybe I'm just being fattest or maybe I'm just not used to people of a larger size being cast in these roles and that's something that needs to be changed, with this film leading the way, but honestly I felt that they both needed to be a tad younger and she just didn't have the charisma to get away with her look, because her face was like an eight day clock too.

The kid, Brandon (Caden Dragomer) was annoying as well, not a good actor at all and slightly sickly to watch.

What I really was impressed by was the fact that the songs were performed by people that could actually sing for a change. I don't know if it was the actors themselves or somebody else, but I didn't care, because so many of these films have failed to deliver with decent voices before.

However, I did think that "Sweet 16 Christmas" seemed like it would be a better choice for a younger singer. Taylor Swift or Bieber back in the day, that sort of thing.

It wasn't the worst film in the end, but I would probably only forward to seeing Brandon with his top off and call it a day if I somehow recorded it again. It just didn't have that X factor that gets it added to my list of repeat watchers.

4.75/1000.

This is without doubt the most delusional film I have ever seen in my entire life. The script and concept is paper thin. The lead actors are not believable and have zero chemistry. Even the presence of a cute kid does nothing to help this lame hopefully soon to be forgotten film. Christmas films are frequently lacking in realism but there has to be a limit surely. I started to watch by accident. Did not want to continue but it was so bad I had to keep watching to see if there was anything that might salvage it.

I am just hoping that having sat through the entirety of it I can somehow get it out of my brain.