A Blue Ridge Mountain Christmas premiered on Hallmark Movies & Mysteries' Miracles of Christmas on November 7th and stars Rachael Leigh Cook (Willow) and Benjamin Ayres (David).
RATING (out of 5): 🎄
General Movie Details: Willow is returning to her hometown from NYC to help her sister finalize plans for her wedding in a month (2 days before Christmas). Turns out that the venue for the wedding needs to change and Willow knows the perfect place to host the wedding, the inn her family used to own. Now she just needs to convince the current owner, David, who is trying to sell the inn to let her transform the Eagle Ridge Inn back to the magical Christmas place she remembers in time for the wedding.
Meet Cute Moment: They meet in the barn at the inn. It turns out that David is the best friend (and best man) to the fiance of Willow's sister Juni. Unfortunately there really was nothing cute about this meeting.
Giant Nutcracker Sighting: There were two giant Nutcrackers outside the coffee shop in town which we see several times in passing. The coffee shop gets several mentions throughout the movie but we never really get to see the shop but if the giant Nutcrackers are any indication the Christmas force is strong with them. The diner that Willow's mom owns will need to keep up the Christmas spirit to continue to compete. The diner does have Christmas games so that is something but it seems like this Christmas decorating competitiveness is one-sided and the plot line is minimally developed. Another fun spotting is the life-size statue of a king in one of the shop windows they pass by several times while walking in town. I am calling him Henry VIII but I know that's not correct. Either way, he does stand out and looks a bit out of place.
Obligatory moment of snark/personal rant: Sorry about this but there is going to be a lot. The title is A Blue Ridge Mountain Christmas... This is a complete misnomer, there is no indication that they are in the Blue Ridge Mountains. There isn't even one of the cute "Entering Town of XXX" signs, my spouse and I were looking. Maybe I also take issue because I've been in the Blue Ridge Mountain area and know the stunning landscapes that can be seen. There was not even a wide angle mountain shot. There was a wide angle driving on a snowing road shot in the beginning but the movie was devoid of mountainous vista shots or any winding roads as they travel along. There are a few scenes in town but you don't get a lot of the small town feels you get with other movies. There is no real sense of place. The movie would have been more aptly named Christmas (Wedding) at Eagle Ridge Inn because that's what the movie was really about. So in the beginning of the movie we see Willow in NY at what appears to be an office party and we learn that she might be transferred to another office and that the company she works for is in the hotel/hospitality business. She later says that she's an assistant manager in a hotel but then she puts together a proposal for her company to invest in the inn and that she would be on-site to run it. I'm confused because an assistant manager would not be in a position to put together a proposal for investors and have it taken seriously in the very short time frame she has. Willow what exactly is your job, do you even know? You appear to work in an office and not in the hotel so I am guessing that maybe you started as an assistant manager and have worked your way up. Finally, Willow tells David that her family will pay for everything they do to the inn to decorate for the wedding and Christmas. I am curious just how much they were willing to spend on the wedding because there are a lot of purchases, rentals and some cleanup and construction. I wonder if Willow even had a budget for the project that she was trying to follow. She rents a horse drawn carriage that is going to take her sister Juni down the drive for the wedding and it gives inn visitors rides for two weeks before the big day. Based on the enormity of her mom's house, she made a lot of money with the sale of the inn, her husband had a very large life insurance policy or her diner is the only restaurant in town. By the way, is it just Willow's mom and her sister Juni living in the huge contemporary colonial? Seems like a lot of extra space and a mismatch in style from the homeyness of the inn, her small town style dinner and the few images we see of the town.
Hallmark Movie Connection: Rachael Leigh Cook was previously in Hallmark's Vineyard series (Autumn, Summer and Valentine... In The Vineyard ) with Brendan Penny. Benjamin Ayres was previously in The Chronicle Mysteries series with Alison Sweeney.
Let me know if you felt any Christmas magic with this one because it left me cold.
No comments:
Post a Comment