Mesma Hora, No Próximo Natal

In a change from the usual Christmas movie this one spans some time. Childhood friends from vacation in Hawaii eventually find love after lots of bad timing. Lea Michelle acts well but she doesn't have much chemistry with her smiling costar Chad Davis.

This would've been so much better if Lea Michelle sang at least once!! Same love triangle (w/ boyfriend from big city) with modern touches - gay couple, interracial couple, & boy star is a divorced dad.

OK. That's it. No more cookie cutter Christmas romances for me. The writings bad, even good actors phone in their performances, and, the romance never plums any depth. I give this film a 4 (poor) out of 10 and abandoned the search for a contemporary Christmas romance. {Christmas Romance}

As far as Hallmark-y type movies go, and especially holiday ones, this one entertained me! I loved the story and I fell in love with the main characters and their families. The love story felt very realistic in terms of real-life issues coming into play. I gave it an 8 because this is a different scale than Hollywood movies. It is a TV movie of course. And quite a good one.

I know Lea Michele mainly from "Glee", where she was a mix of appealing an annoying. I liked her character a lot there, and she has had several TV roles since which I didn't enjoy quite as much. Here she is very appealing and still quite pretty. Her acting is good for this sort of movie.

Charles Michael Davis is also quite appealing. I sort of see where he has a different kind of appeal, but I don't really get the full benefit.

Phil Morris does a very good job, but that's to be expected. He was a detective from "The Young and the Restless" and I have seen him in other roles. I do wonder, though, why so many football metaphors when it's baseball he loves.

Bryan Greenberg has a certain appeal and is not a stereotypical bad guy. He just doesn't fit with this group and we know it. His attempt to be one of them is impressive. We just doubt we'll be quite happy with him.

Of course this movie fits a formula. It's a great formula. Sure, there is a little more uncertainty than I would have liked, but the ending is satisfactory. Or maybe it's more than that. I don't want to say too much.

Is this family friendly? I'd like to say so. On ABC it was rated TV-PG-D, and while I don't recall anything of an explicit nature, maybe they were being cautious because there were kids in the cast.

I don't see nearly enough of these movies. Aside from the fact that I don't want to spend the kind of money required to get all the channels, I wouldn't have time for all the movies like this on a certain channel whose name we all know.

But if I had to see just one of these movies this year (and I'm hoping the channels I have will offer more of them later) this is a good one.