2025, Lucie Guest (Jingle Bell Run) -- download
Hallmarkie Fatigue is settling in and I realize I might just have to (gasp!) actually prepare for this come next year -- as in, actually research and only watch movies that scratch the itch, instead of just downloading / clicking a bunch of random ones that check some boxes. But what am I searching for? Well, either completely bonkers weird, or adherence to a particular sub-sub-genre of the Hallmarkie that checks all the PST Xmas boxes on my Bingo card. I know I said I would relax my demands on the movies and just allow them to be but... as the fatigue is settling in, I am unable.
This was not an Xmas movie.
The Draw: Partially to give another go at "Hallmarkie in ______", as this one is set and actually shot in the French Alps... well, for the key outdoor shots where a mountain or quite Alp village was required. The rest of the interior stuff was done in Sofia, Bulgaria. But but, that was the draw.
HERstory: This is not primarily an example of the "Main Travels to PST" trope, and the romance is actually the secondary element to the movie. It is more about the reacquainting of two somewhat estranged sisters: Faith (Ashley Williams, How I Met Your Mother) and Kelly (Lacy J Mailey, Supernatural). They are drawn together near Xmas because their grandmother, who raised them, recently passed away. Faith is a free spirit, never settling down, who wants Kelly to join her in Florida for the holiday season, while Kelly is a stayed-at-home type, still in the apartment they were raised in.
Early in the tense interactions they are interrupted by a call from a lawyer -- they are beckoned to a meeting where they find a request from their grandmother --- travel together to Mont Blanc in the French Alps, to follow the trail grandmother and her fiancé took ages ago. Its all planned and paid for, and a guide will be waiting for them when the plane leaves. They have to do before Xmas Eve.
Initially the differences between the two sisters dominates, as Faith is more than happy to run away to France at the drop of a hat, while Kelly has work work stuff. But, of course, at the last moment she recollects how much her grandmother's wishes meant to her and chases after the Uber.
In France they meet Frédéric (Julien Marlon Samani, Tiny Beautiful Things), the schmoozy self-confident guide who wastes no time hitting on Kelly. I should probably mention that there are some years between the sisters, and Kelly is the young-enough-for-romantic-entanglement sister while Faith has her already established romantic troubles -- she's been proposed to by a longtime boyfriend, but ran away instead of saying Yes. But nobody knows this yet.
Given that Xmas plays very little in this movie, I have no desire to count the beats / tropes. Let's just say the journey is fraught with sister trauma but slowly draws out the attraction between Kelly and Frédéric. The drama between the two sisters takes the front seat in the funicular ride.
Yawn.
I found it very weird to traversing a new romance while reminiscing about one that ended in a proposal. If anything, they should have jumped the shark and have Faith's BF show up on the mountain to pop her the question a second time. But no, it was more just about instilling a sense of adventure in Kelly so she would take a chance on love she just met.
In the end, the two sisters loudly air their dirty laundry prompting Frédéric a number of times, until it comes to a head and the trio makes it to the top of the mountain, to see the spot where their grandmother and grandfather began their married life together. It sets the tone, and once back down in the lovely village of Chamonix, Kelly tells Frédéric she'd love to take a chance, and Faith decides to tell her BF the Yes Word.
One year later, Faith is preggers and ... I guess Frédéric is living in NYC with Kelly? Oh, and its Xmas again, not that it mattered.
The Formulae: Xmas barely took part in this movie. But I guess the tropes exist outside of the Hallmarkie (a label I attached purely to Xmas Time Hallmark [and type] movies) so, there is "We Just Met But I Love You", there is "I Am Not Quite Sure I Want to Commit", there are Dead Parents, Frédéric was not pursuing the life he really wanted to pursue (becoming a musician), there was some Hot Chocolate to be had, but that was more related to being on the side of a ski resort mountain than anything. Are cozy fires in a snowbound shack common enough to be a trope?
Unformulae: Its more about sister re-bonding than about the romance. There is no real PST and it might start in NYC but its not really there.
True Calling? Once they changed the name to "holiday", yes.
The Rewind: No rewind, but a few pauses at the actual shots of the tourist spots sitting on the top of peaks around Mont Blanc -- they are truly incredible and give me butterflies just imagining how they were constructed. Also, a chuckle at the memory from a photographer's review of Hallmark movies, "YOU CAN'T TAKE A SELFIE WITH THAT CAMERA !" as Kelly takes tons of selfies with a high end digital SLR that does not have an appropriate lens.
The Regulars: I was here for Ashley Williams, who is Royalty. Laci J Mailey is a staple Canadian actor but not in Hallmarkies. Samani hasn't done any, but he was in Holidate.
How does it Hallmark? I am not sure I can properly judge the movie on being a Hallmark movie, as the sisterly drama may be a staple out there, but it is mos def not a good Hallmarkie as Xmas barely plays out at all.
How does it movie? No.
How Does It Snow? In town, it could be October, but when on the mountain side, it was proper PROPER snow, as in trudging in blowing white out conditions.
Ooooh, he was French Luc in Holidate, Sloan's ex-bf. He's a pretty pretty man.
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