'Twas the Text Before Christmas

I really like both leads as I've seen them in other movies where they've shone. This wasn't the case. The premise was nice enough but the characters lacked credibility and depth.

After the meet cute, their chemistry seemed lacking as another reviewer said there was no angst. There was no pining, no emotions or longing just gestures. Found this a tiresome, boring watch to be honest even for this genre. I think the use of year in the life was wasted and could have been better captured though I understand the time limitations.

I loved the family feel to the movie and the settings which were beautiful. The acting wasn't too bad too though contrived at times.

The GAF movies I wave watched so far have improved a little this year but the decorations & set design are awful to look at; too much just lumped on and it appears its recycled into several movies. It takes away from the improved story telling. Even the snow is visibly fake, no care is taken to create a convincing illusion of it. Someone is a sleep on the job and could do so much better with some effort Please please do not let your audiences and cast down with this lack of attention to the canvass on which the stories are told. Without which we are better off listening and not watching and that's a real let down.

The basic motif to see it was, in my case, Trevor Donovan. And, indeed, he does a nice job . Good parts, forced final, fair portrait of Nana and some strange situations. But, more important, a pretty inspired start point , not too inspired used but , in good measure, acceptable.

I like it because I have not high expectations. A wrong phone number, the Christmas in Vermont of a New Yorker young lady, her boyfriends as autumn leaves and his father living between Australia of son and USA of daughter, family and a venerable couple at new chance of happiness and a burned turkey, a dog and a charming grandmother.

For a nice evening, good option.

The last GAF movie I watched had over the top autumn decorations and annoying background music. Fast forward to this Christmas movie and now we have over the top Christmas decor and more distracting background music. I'm not sure who thinks this adds to the movies but please stop!

Other than these distractions, I thought it was a good movie although the pace was slow, especially the romance between Addie and James. The leads, Merritt Patterson and Trevor Donovan, worked well together and I liked the interactions with Jayne Eastwood's "Nana". Probably not a movie I'd watch again but enjoyable for a one time view.

Love the ex-pat actors from Hallmark (Trevor Donovan & Merritt Patterson) but these GAF movies are super low budget and desperately in need of better dialog with very limited scenery. Even the Xmas decorations look cheap compared to the competition of Xmas movies from Hallmark, UPTV, Lifetime, etc. I devour Xmas and romance movies so I'm a conosseur of this genre and frankly after the first 15-20 min, I fast forward to the end and didn't miss much with this film.

I'm a big fan of the lead actors and the plots of their past Hallmark movies were way more complex and watchable compared to this GAF release. I know many actors moved to GAF to get production credit but obviously they didn't get script approval. This movie felt more like a low budget community stage production with a quickly written script than what I've grown to expect from other seasonal releases.