Christmas Lovers Anonymous

Watch this with your partner and you will reference it for years to come. Where others complain of a lack of acting prowess or inconsistency, I find charm and humor. Go into this movie with a smile on your face and you will leave with an even bigger one. Watching this movie, versus a high-budget A-list Christmas movie is the difference between buying Christmas gifts from the nice grandma at your local antique store versus buying consumerist junk at your country-wide, soulless department store. It may not be what they want, but it's what you want them to have, and they will love it. Just say "yes" to Christmas Lovers Anonymous.

Katrina gets fired and dumped just before Christmas so she writes a book attacking Christmas and the book takes off. Trouble is, she still loves Christmas at heart, but can't celebrate it publicly. Hunter gets assigned to write an article about her and the book. They both sign up for a website Christmas Lover's Anonymous. Hence a variation of You've Got Mail. Many similarities follow.

Katrina is spacey. Her book stems from a temper tantrum. She is impulsive. Hunter is not particularly appealing either. There is no chemistry between Brooke Burfitt and Houston Rhines but that is not surprising given that their screen time together comes from random encounters rather than extended time together.

The dialogue is flat. The acting is fair at best. The story is just not that interesting. There are no highs or lows or surprises. The entire feel of this movie is that it lacks the polish.

There is a sequence with both Hunter and Katrina getting ready to meet where both are figuring out what to wear while talking with their closest confidents. It has all the usual. "This one? No. That one." "You like him." "You like her." "No it's just a meeting." The entire sequence was juvenile, flat and not funny.

In the You've Got Mail takeoffs, it annoys me when one of them says "I hoped it would be you." Is it stealing or homage? In this movie, the line is obvious, but slightly different.

There was something very weird or off about the way this movie looked and sounded. I kept watching it (off and on) in order to figure it out. It seemed very amateurish and produced on a shoestring . It was like it was done with one camera, almost like a cell phone. It was like they shot the movie and then had it redubbed. There was no or very little background noise except for a faint tinkling melody. There was no action or anyone running around, or interacting with extras. The actors just talked at each other, like they were taking turns reading their lines. During a break, a voice came on that essentially thanked viewers for leaving Hallmark and "coming home" to GFam. Desperate and divisive. Like an us versus them mentality. Not exactly Christian or in the spirit of Christmas. But an attitude I guess I would expect by those who are the money behind this network. I'm going to rate it but am giving them the benefit of the doubt since I didn't see the whole thing. Basically another weak version of the "you've got mail" plot.

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As an avid watcher of Christmas movies I can confidently say I had a mole removed last year and that was more fun than watching this movie. The casting looked as though the director walked into a Golden Corral and picked the first people he saw. The dialogue had the intelligence of a third grader, and yet the actors somehow still struggled to deliver their lines. However, I gave it two stars because the movie was relatively short, putting us out of our misery in a timely manner. When I was a child, I had two pet fish. One tried to attack and kill the other. Those fish had more chemistry than these two main characters. Overall, say no to this show show show.

The story was awesome just the lighting and acting seemed like a movie from the 70's seems like they were trying to hard to say their lines like reading cue cards . Not a great movie. This movie could have been way better . I know the actors took cues from directors and producers so they need to check their skills. I hope they try to get this better . I'm not a expert however I watch lots of movies. I love GAC this needs to get better before people stop watching this channel . I pray it gets better and they learn from their mistakes . Thanks GAC fir all you do . I will keep watching and waiting .