Melancholy Christmas
I collect Hallmark Christmas ornaments. I watch Hallmark mystery movies. And yet, I had never watched a Hallmark Christmas movie until this year. I dipped my toe in to that genre with Holly & Ivy, which turned out to be a melancholy movie.
The story focuses on Melody (Janel Parrish). She’s just moved to a small Wisconsin town and bought a fixer upper. Her dream job of a children’s librarian has just fallen through, but she is determined to get a job in the area. In the meantime, she meets her neighbor Nina (Marissol Nichols) and Nina’s two daughters Holly and Ivy (Sadie Coleman and Piper Rubio). She quickly bonds with them, especially over a shared love of books.
Melody plans to fix up her house herself, and it’s at the hardware store that she meets Adam (Jeremy Jordan), a local contractor. Adam dreams of running his own home-made furniture business instead of the construction business, however. Then, Melody suddenly needs to get her home up to code in a hurry. Can she do it before Christmas?
Quite obviously, there is a lot going on in this movie. I felt it did a good job of balancing everything while also letting us get to know the characters and watching them develop.
One place the movie fell down is how quickly it rushed things. Melody makes a big commitment to Nina for someone she hasn’t known very long. I get that it drives the rest of the movie, but making a commitment like that in a matter of days? Maybe it was weeks, but it felt more condensed than that. I just had a hard time buying into that premise. I expected a bit of a rushed romance between Melody and Adam, but I appreciated how that played out.
Which brings us to my other issue with the movie. This is a serious movie for a Christmas movie. I was expecting something more like a romantic comedy, and Melody and Adam’s relationship fell into those tropes. However, the storyline with Nina, Holly, and Ivy was much more serious. It walked the fine line of being a true downer, and at times it crossed that line for me. The ending of the movie was very bitter sweet, so it did redeem itself in the end a little, but it did lean toward the bitter side.
The acting is what you’d expect from a Hallmark movie. It’s adequate. It mostly keeps the cheese to a minimum, even covering up some of the cheese in the script.
So, why did I start with this movie? Because the book that Melody and Holly first bond over is a Trixie Belden book. I am a huge Trixie fan, so I had to watch this movie for that reason. The book shows up in a couple of scenes, and I definitely enjoyed those.
I’ve got to admit, the serious tone in Holly & Ivy makes me reluctant to watch any more Hallmark Christmas movies. But I might venture into one or two others before I decide against them completely. It probably won’t be this year, however, since I am quickly running out of month, and I have some old favorites to rewatch.
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