Christmas by the Book

Unfortunately not every holiday Hallmark movie is a winner. This one...major miss. The lead actress is too young, too thin, and too unbelievable to be an expert in anything let alone a romantic lead. She's too uptight. The male lead would be okay with a different actress and the protagonist ex-girlfriend is a dud and a bad actress. Really, skip this movie. It's flat, not romantic or Christmassy and not up to our Hallmark standard of rom-com expectations.

Clumsily written, poorly acted and just an overall ill conceived mess. The cast as a whole were the dullest and potentially ugliest bunch ever assembled for a Hallmark movie.o

There is not much to add that has not already been said by others. This movie is bland and the chemistry is lacking between the two leads. It really wasn't clear who the lead male, Ted, liked. Ted's girlfriend/exgirlfriend was a confusing character because she seemed to vacillate between low-grade evil to manipulative to confused but good-hearted. I would compare this film to flavorless cotton candy, it didn't provide enjoyment but wasn't particularly offensive.

At the time of this wrting, all the reivews of this movie are negative. While I think the criticisms were just I would recommend it to you to watch at least once.

I would agree on several things. First, the production values were lacking. Two, the plot was not really Christmas centric (this could have been a winter fest, spring fling, summer of fun, or fall harvest movie by simply mad libbing buzz words.

However, it had one thing most Hallmark Rom-Coms do not have. It had comedy. It was funny, with witty dialogue and situations. That carried the movie and made it stand out for me.

Watched about 5 min. Acting horrible and could not watch the too too thin actress.