Where Are You, Christmas?

It is difficult to find truly new themes for these Christmas movies. It was a good effort borrowing the main idea from Pleasantville to give us a new angle for this Christmas movie. But when it comes down to it, there were still many of the usual Christmas movie subplots. Addy living in big city Chicago comes home for Christmas. Like many of the leads in Christmas movies, she hasn't been home in a while and there is family resentment. And even Addy is having trouble finding her Christmas spirit. It gets so bad that she wishes Christmas away completely.

The rest of the movie is Addy trying to restore the color of Christmas, first to those around her and ultimately to herself. She quickly teams up with her romantic opposite, Hunter.

I usually consider Michael Rady to be one of Hallmark's go-to actors, but I was disappointed this time. He and Lyndsy Fonseca didn't have much chemistry and the inevitable love affair between the characters lacked credibility. Part of this was because Addy was the center of the story until later in the story and until then Hunter was secondary. Another reason for lack of chemistry was the attitude of Hunter. His wish to stay out of the spotlight came off as him wanting to be a victim.

I thought the vehicle for Addy's restoration was obvious until it wasn't. I was mostly wrong leaving the movie with a cliche ending.

Still, give the movie points for a new take on losing the Christmas spirit. My interest was maintained to the end despite my preferring a slightly different ending.

First, nice story, very typical Hallmark (with can be a good thing). The two leads had great chem and were nice to watch together. Lyndsy was funny on her own and a better actor than some of the other Hallmark Heroines.

But there were too many problems to overcome for me to like this more.

1) Dad's constant passive aggressiveness toward his daughter. No wonder she doesn't come back more often. I know I wouldn't if I had face that barrage of attacks.

2) The green screen effects for a bunch of the fake backgrounds (in color or BW) were so cheap, I thought they were done with an iPhone. I guess if they had to blow their budget on the BW -> Color stuff, something else was going to suffer

3) Dad DOESN'T get his color after the heartfelt convo with daughter, but only when the rest of the town sings his praises... self-centered much?

4) Too much of a rip off of Pleasantville. My wife and I often play the "guess the movie it's based on", but this wasn't even subtle.

Good people in a less than good movie.

Lynsy Fonseca has a future in Christmas movies and this outing shows that 2021's Next Stop, Christmas was not a fluke for her. That was one of the best outings of the year and I have a feeling this will be one of the best if this year.

The casting of the leads was spot on. While they're wasn't a crazy connection where they looked like they wanted to jump into bed, the connection they did have appeared genuine and was very sweet. He played the recluse well.

Obviously some lines were overly cheesy but the script seemed to be of a high quality, there were funny parts, endearing parts, realistic parts.

Some parts the production quality were really. Really bad. But it happens.

This is one I will likely watch again in future years.

Very rare to enjoy a new holiday movie,that Hallmark has put out over the years.. With that said,was it perfect? No! Was full of clichés,including taking a concept done from Pleasantville.

However actually nice it wasn't about saving a business,festivals or usual themed topics.

Was cast ok,feel another lead actress might of did better.

Didn't even recognize Julie Warner,until double checking who the mom was played by.

Acting overall was decent enough,as well the cinematography.. Some color adjustments despite the black & white parts felt dull in vibrancy,so that may of helped it feel more magical.

Music didn't overwhelm the conversations,but could be toned a bit.

As mentioned rare to enjoy newer movies,have only liked a handful in years because Hallmark mass produces cookie cutter productions.

Worth checking out,as its something different.. Well,for Hallmark anyway.

First of all, don't expect strict realism from this movie; it's more of a fantasy.

Once you accept that, I think it's really well done. There are a few sketchy and unexplained parts, such as how an app can grant a wish and erase the memory of Christmas from the entire world, but as I said, it's a fantasy. Lyndsy Fonseca, I think, was a great choice for this movie and I felt a great deal of sympathy and affinity for her character. When she first meets up with her romantic interest (Hunter), you can tell he is quite taken by her. And I can understand why.

I was impressed with the merging of color and black-and-white portions in the scenes, and I think it added a great deal to the film. It was also interesting to see how the normally good-hearted characters could be so easily portrayed as not so pleasant with the change in circumstances, particularly the father. The ending could probably have been written a little better, but overall it was an enjoyable movie and I'd probably watch it again.