‘Twas the Date Before Christmas
‘Twas the first flick of the season
After one bad date after another, what’s a gal to do but agree to the ultimate pressure cooker of a first date: bringing a blind date home for the annual “Chamberlain Family Christmas Olympics.” I mean… worse things have happened… right?!? This honestly reminded me of a book I read years ago The Year of Yes by Maria Dahvana Headley | Goodreads. Some questionable decision-making notwithstanding, sometimes you need to just roll the dice.
All in all, this was a decent launch in Hallmark’s Countdown to Christmas this year, with plenty of classic Christmas movie tropes to launch us right into the season.
And, as per usual, seeing a house fully decked out for the holidays as only a Hallmark house can be immediately reignited my barely-dormant desire to moonlight as a Christmas movie set decorator / Christmas-only interior decorator for real. I also love a wink-wink, “is the old aunt getting it on with her Uber driver who seems to show up at random?” My only beef was that for a movie centrered around “family traditions,” everything on screen is so clean and NEW. Even in a house that the family Stone would almost appreciate #IYKYK.
Classic Christmas movie tropes:
Filmed in Canada
Ugly Christmas sweaters abound
“Christmas Olympics” holiday events:
Gift wrapping “wrap battle” contest
Snowball fight
Newlywed game
Search for the Christmas star
Protagonist is a widow of sorts
You’ll like this if…
You enjoy the classic Hallmark movie tropes with minimal conflict or emotional drama. A good first movie for the season.
