Sense, Sensibility & Snowmen

5/10 - this movie stacks holiday movie cliché upon holiday movie cliché and will not be remembered in more than a few weeks

Despite not being all that enamoured generally with Hallmark's 2019 output, 'Sense, Sensibility and Snowmen' was still seen for completest sake. As well as because of my lifelong love for Christmas and my love for the source material that the film is loosely inspired by (Jane Austen's 'Sense and Sensibility'). Luke Macfarlane is always watchable. Despite what people might think reading past reviews for Hallmark's festive offerings, some of which are quite critical, not all of them are bad. There are above average ones out there.

'Sense, Sensibility and Snowmen' isn't one of them sadly. The premise sounded like there would be a couple of attempts to be different, but mostly story-wise it was typical Hallmark in the cookie cutter fashion that is seen in too many of their Christmas offerings. As far as Hallmark's 2019 Christmas films go, 'Sense, Sensibility and Snowmen' is neither one of the best or worst, somewhere around low middle. As a film on its own, it didn't strike me as a terrible film but it is a long way from great.

There are good things here definitely, it takes a lot for me actually to call a Hallmark film or anything film/television etc-related irredeemable. It's nicely filmed and has some very eye catching scenery. There are some pleasant moments on the soundtrack.

Macfarlane is a likeable enough male lead and Kimberley Sustad is spirited support.

Erin Krakow however is the opposite. She badly overacts with no attempts at nuance or making the character more than a stereotype and the character grates very quickly, nothing likeable or endearing about her. She has no chemistry with Macfarlane, they even look uncomfortable together. All the chemistry seemed disconnected between all and the rest of the acting is nothing memorable. The direction never rises above workmanlike at best and tends to be pedestrian.

While the soundtrack has moments, it tends to be used too much and over-scored. Very intrusive too often. The script is basically the shallowest of froths, more sugary than a candy cane and cheesier than cheese gone off. The story is very dull and thin, and is also very contrived and without anything fresh. The characters don't engage or are easy to root for on the whole, especially Ella.

Summing up, very lacklustre. 4/10

Having to carry erin through this movie. She is so smug and annoying.

We start off with the cliche of the "Holiday Spirit challenged exec", and it doesn't really get any better. That was disappointing, because there are three people in this movie that we enjoyed in other Christmas movies (Nine Lives of Christmas, Mistletoe Promise, and the "Finding Father Christmas" trilogy).

Here, however, the entire foundation of character interaction is built on awkward conversations. That would be OK, except there is far too much of it, and the actors try to sell it by "act cute", rather than just performing. The result comes off very stilted, unnatural, and at times just annoying.

This won't be on our rewatch list.

5.6 stars.

Reminds me of my high school days. This is not something to take seriously. It's as if a bunch of awkward teenagers inherited multi-million dollar companies, and were left to their own devices to run them into the ground.

The older sister and responsible guy have the burden of keeping the younger ones focused and on track. Younger sister and her guy are acting like 16 year olds, and their older counterparts are like parents, yet they are all basically the same age. Younger sister is trying to get her older sister to be proud of her, but is she really? I don't know to be honest, it's all over the place.

It's a semi-fun movie, like a couple of kids are doing a school project with no sense of responsibility.

What's not to love about the cast? I like all of them, they rarely disappoint. This looks like it was a fun script, but who is the targeted demographic? Doesn't seem to be a kids movie, not for the YA fans, so whom? I am getting mixed feelings, but nothing is coming to mind but one word: silly.

Go into this with no expectations, just to smile and have some fun. Break out the hot chocolate, put this on if you have no agenda for anything with a particular theme or purpose.