Christmas In My Heart (2021) -
I love Luke Macfarlane and generally his Christmas films are done really well to warm the heart, but it was tough to buy him in his role of Sean in this film. He hasn't really played the part of a tough and aggro guy before, except perhaps in his role of D'avin In 'Killjoys' (2015-9), but even then it was more a case of "I'm a lover, not a fighter". As such his defensive and enigmatic, reclusive country star thing, didn't really work for me.
And I don't know if that was my boyfriend (Luke) singing, but it didn't sound as good to me as they all thought it did (I'm sure it was the sound departments fault and not Luke's).
It was also a bit too obviously clear that nobody in the film was playing their own instruments.
Sean's daughter Katie, played by Maria Nash, delivered her role very well, with none of the sickly sweetness that comes from the brats that are usually in these films.
And Heather Hemmens was fine in her part of Beth, but I didn't actually make any notes about her at all, so I would probably define her as a bit middle of the road.
Other than the tick box of Christmas activities and the lazy writing to create the meet/cute and continued relationship, including daft arguments, the only other thing that I noticed was that once again the number of supporting artists was laughingly insufficient! We don't even cost that much for the day, but tree lighting events and "Sold Out" performances are always under attended by my standards of what a successful event should look like.
I might be inclined to give this film another try in a few years but that would mostly be because Luke Macfarlane was in it. I've seen similar stories done better and I'd rather revisit them.
550.01.
I love Luke Macfarlane and generally his Christmas films are done really well to warm the heart, but it was tough to buy him in his role of Sean in this film. He hasn't really played the part of a tough and aggro guy before, except perhaps in his role of D'avin In 'Killjoys' (2015-9), but even then it was more a case of "I'm a lover, not a fighter". As such his defensive and enigmatic, reclusive country star thing, didn't really work for me.
And I don't know if that was my boyfriend (Luke) singing, but it didn't sound as good to me as they all thought it did (I'm sure it was the sound departments fault and not Luke's).
It was also a bit too obviously clear that nobody in the film was playing their own instruments.
Sean's daughter Katie, played by Maria Nash, delivered her role very well, with none of the sickly sweetness that comes from the brats that are usually in these films.
And Heather Hemmens was fine in her part of Beth, but I didn't actually make any notes about her at all, so I would probably define her as a bit middle of the road.
Other than the tick box of Christmas activities and the lazy writing to create the meet/cute and continued relationship, including daft arguments, the only other thing that I noticed was that once again the number of supporting artists was laughingly insufficient! We don't even cost that much for the day, but tree lighting events and "Sold Out" performances are always under attended by my standards of what a successful event should look like.
I might be inclined to give this film another try in a few years but that would mostly be because Luke Macfarlane was in it. I've seen similar stories done better and I'd rather revisit them.
550.01.