Sur la piste de Noël

Once in a while, Lifetime forgoes its mission to indoctrinate the viewers and remembers how to create entertainment. And comes out with a charming production which is original, entertaining, and rich in meaningful motives. New romance is entwined with enduring love and respect for traditions, in a contest of 50ies nostalgia and a pinch of magic. Would I want to see it with a few changes? Sure, like taming the newspaper director, perhaps unnecessarily harsh and villainous, but all quite minimal. The movie is good, as is. And,.... it does bring a little magic to our Christmas.

This Christmas RomCom has writing that is layered, acting that is fun almost goofy and yet the characters are true somehow. Then there is a magnificent scene with actress Jill Frappier. The leads are fun to watch as they give much more than the average RomCom expects and before I knew it I was completely buying into the rose colored Christmas RomCom slow burn. The film sets up and delivers on all it's premisses. After the nice build up it concludes with a very satisfying and unexpected climactic declaration of love(s). I wanted these characters to get together much more than I normally do in most RomComs. But for me it is the scene with Jill Frappier that made me actually spend money to buy the movie. She gave the whole love story(s) themes credibility, even if love rarely reaches the conclusion her character achieves. It's rare for me that an older actor in a supporting role inspires me to want to own a movie but Ms Frappier did just that. I wont spoil anything but do turn on the subtitles for the last quarter of the movie so you can get the full revelation of the setup and the superior writing this lightweight movie. I watch a lot of RomComs and this one is wonderful. But let me be clear it is still a cheesy RomCom, just a very good cheesy RomCom.

I really liked this one! I loved that it revolved around a hometown mystery and a 1950/s musical complete Let's with a dance routine at the end. As a fan of old musicals especially "singin in the rain" I loved the homages. As lifetime/hallmark Christmas movies go this was one of my faves so far this year.

I like it fo For the retro air. For the desire to craft a different Christmas movie in Hallmark style. For venerable actors and for the references to classics ( indeed, a pig in leach is not a leopard ).

But the basic sin remains the forced use of pieces. The twist is far to impress. The search and the reaction to article are not very inspired .

Remains the delicate flavors of old times. And a modest, against its ambitions, Christmas film. The beautiful detail - the confession of Margaret Westdale about the romance of youth. So, the gratitude to Jill Frapier can be one of precious gifts of film. Is it enough ? Maybe.

I really enjoyed this movie. At last Mar Vista did a decent thing here. That is until the very end.

The climax of the story actually brought a tear to my eye and I was excited to see such a wonderful story culminate in the MCs love for one another. And then that stupid kiss at the end. What is even up with that? I don't know what's going on with the idea of the camera angles but they're obstructive and they destroy a good thing. Are they afraid I'm going to see a slip of the tongue or actual lips touching? They should be embarrassed.

Well, what did I expect. Whether it's Lifetime or Hallmark, they both have a way of destroying a good story and the really good ones are so rare.

I don't know what they were trying to do with this ending but it was by far one of the sappiest most ridiculous things I've ever witnessed in any of these movies. They took a wonderful story and completely ruined it. I don't even know if I can bring myself to watch another one.

If you want to see decent Christmas romance movies check out Netflix. At least you know the couple's having sex before they even utter those three words and it's a refreshing change to this nonsense.