Once again the story seems to depend on overly used themes from other Christmas movies. A contest which ends up being between the two leads. So what else is new? There is one slightly different aspect which is a flaw in itself. Holly, the female lead, can't bake to save her life. She is a food stylist. She's so bad baking that she doesn't know when to use eggs and when not. But in a few short days she learns and becomes competitive with the best in the town. Did I mention that she has also applied for her "dream job" in far away New York. You can usually say that adherence to reality is tenuous in these movies, but this time they went too far with a ridiculous premise. Also there's very little tension or highs and lows in this story because we can all see where it is going. The climax deviates slightly in a couple details from the expected, but still not that much.
Speaking of climax, to me it fell flat. It happened, and the characters seemed flat responding to it. Oh yeah, she will completely change her plans and not think twice about it.
I didn't care for most of the acting. I got very tired of Loretta Devine. Part of that was her voice, but she didn't seem natural either. I've seen Greyston Holt before and he and some of the supporting actors were OK. I totally didn't remember ever seeing Adeline Kane before, but after looking at her profile, I've seen her twice. (I didn't even notice her as being on Seal Team and totally forgot the movie with her opposite Penavega.). She's beautiful and she fit the character of Holly OK, but she also had no spark. She and Holt fit well together, but again, no spark.
Despite all my complaints, it wasn't flat out bad. Just more of the same during a season of wall-to-wall Christmas movies on at least four different channels, some 24/7.
BTW: it's hilarious how many movies get at least one review calling a Hallmark movie one from Lifetime, or vice versa. Look at the cover pic. This one is Lifetime and theirs has bottom third section a solid color(I think always blue) with the movie title in it. Hallmark usually has just a thin solid strip with "Hallmark" in it. A lot of their movies are pretty similar, but Lifetime is more likely to stand out as different once in a while.
Speaking of climax, to me it fell flat. It happened, and the characters seemed flat responding to it. Oh yeah, she will completely change her plans and not think twice about it.
I didn't care for most of the acting. I got very tired of Loretta Devine. Part of that was her voice, but she didn't seem natural either. I've seen Greyston Holt before and he and some of the supporting actors were OK. I totally didn't remember ever seeing Adeline Kane before, but after looking at her profile, I've seen her twice. (I didn't even notice her as being on Seal Team and totally forgot the movie with her opposite Penavega.). She's beautiful and she fit the character of Holly OK, but she also had no spark. She and Holt fit well together, but again, no spark.
Despite all my complaints, it wasn't flat out bad. Just more of the same during a season of wall-to-wall Christmas movies on at least four different channels, some 24/7.
BTW: it's hilarious how many movies get at least one review calling a Hallmark movie one from Lifetime, or vice versa. Look at the cover pic. This one is Lifetime and theirs has bottom third section a solid color(I think always blue) with the movie title in it. Hallmark usually has just a thin solid strip with "Hallmark" in it. A lot of their movies are pretty similar, but Lifetime is more likely to stand out as different once in a while.