CHRISTMAS AT CARTWRIGHT'S (2014)

"Christmas is about profit and numbers."

Alicia Witt is unemployed as fuck, broke as fuck and fucked as fuck cuz she cannot pay her rent, she has a super annoying kid she has to provide for and it's Christmas. But wait a minute cause undercover angel Wallace Shawn performs some olde tyme Christmas angel witchcraft and gets Alicia a job as a store Santa at the prestigious Cartwright’s department store. Oooooooooooh! Fancy. Now you might be asking yourself: how does the payroll and tax stuff work with a woman secretly acting as a dude at a job where literally nobody knows her secret…and you might even be curious how she was able to pay her overdue back-rent after only being on the job for like three days, but, you see, you’re thinking too much! This is a Hallmark movie, motherfucker! Relax. Take your big, ol’ overheated noodle and put it on a shelf and quit thinking. If you do insist on thinking while you watch this upbeat motherfucker, think about how easy (and fun) it would be to re-edit this into a horror movie. Example: Wallace Shawn isn't an actual angel...he's just fucking crazy.

As much as I would like to be a Hallmark movie expert, I’m not (since I don’t come across the DVD’s that much), but I have thoroughly enjoyed the ones that I have seen. CHRISTMAS AT CARTWRIGHT'S is no different. It’s awesome. The story is predictable as fuck, the acting is all over the place (especially by the background actors), the annoying child character is easily the most emotionally mature character in the entire film (despite the fact that she cannot spell the words “blue” or “night”), the production design and sets looks interchangeable with other Hallmark films and the positivity! Oh my god. The shit is off the scales! I think I talked back to the television for the entire movie. At one point towards the end, I remember standing straight up and yelling “This fucking movie!!!” with my left arm out. Haha. I was seriously getting upset with the two main characters not hooking up.

Overall, I really enjoyed CHRISTMAS AT CARTWRIGHT'S and was surprised at how much I enjoyed Alicia Witt’s overacting. She was all over the place. It was awesome. Even if her hair was too short. I also really liked Gabriel Hogan. He had a playful demeanor that I thought was cute. His hair was okay.

Now that I think about it, I don't remember seeing any horrible jackets in this movie. That seemed to be a running theme in the couple of films that I saw in the MYSTERY 101 and CHRISTMAS IN EVERGREEN series. I thought that might be a Hallmark, uhhh, hallmark.

[Not part of the review: Cerealously though, if anybody has some Hallmark discs, send them my way.]

Oh fuck...I was just going back and watching it again and I remember in the scene were the kid cannot spell "blue" in class, right when she got it wrong, I said "Stupid!" and at the exact same moment the kid sitting behind her said "Dummy." hahahaha, oh shit I was dying.

MYSTERY 101: PLAYING DEAD (2019)

If anybody out there is making a list of movies where the opening scene is the worst scene of the movie, then go ahead and add MYSTERY 101: PLAYING DEAD to your list. A small town, off-duty cop is out jogging at 5:23 in the morning when she notices the front door to a drug store has all the glass blown outward across the sidewalk. So, being a genius, she doesn’t call for back-up or even have a weapon and enters the darkened store where she is almost immediately bashed over the head with a baseball bat and left for dead.

After that eye-rolling disaster of an opening scene M101:PD gets things into gear and ends up being a delightful and totally enjoyable film. And a nice step up from the original film. The main characters are already established so more time can be spent on the mystery itself. This time around, our hero, Professor Winslow, is working as a literary advisor for a local playhouse during their production of a murder mystery. So, kinda like how there is always mystery and intrigue around Father Brown, it seems that murder also follows Professor Winslow. Crimes happen and before you can say “One of the greatest loses in human history was that Eric Lynch and Rich Piana never met.”, somebody ends up dead and Proffy Slow and that handsome homicide detective with the hideous jacket are teamed up once again. It’s awesome.

Solid pace, better acting than in the first film, that one dude from that one Christmas movie I reviewed recently, a very pretty town, a good mystery with interesting suspects, the same people walking down the same sidewalk as in the first film, a reference to a certain Dashiell Hammett novel (which would explain the Nick and Nora Charles vibes throughout the entire film), more coffee drinking, zero gore, zero nudity, zero cheerleaders.

I doubt that MYSTERY 101: PLAYING DEAD will change your life or anything, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I liked that the two main characters were more playful this time around. It was cute.

Part 1 - Mystery 101 (2019)
Part 3 - Mystery 101: Words Can Kill (2019)
Part 4 - Mystery 101: Dead Talk (2019)
Part 5 - Mystery 101: An Education in Murder (2020)
Part 6 - Mystery 101: Killer Timing (2021)
Part 7 - Mystery 101: Deadly History (2021)

MYSTERY 101 (2019)

Midsomer Murders it’s not. After opening with an extremely weak murder, we’re introduced to English literature professor Amy Winslow (played by Jill Wagner). One of Professor Winslow’s students is worried about her missing boyfriend, so, being a caring soul, the professor decides to help the student. At the same time, a new (handsome) homicide detective is brought onto the local small town police force and his partner happens to be one of Professor Winslow’s past students. I’m sure we can see where this is going. That’s right, Professor Winslow gets a bad case of the wonky britches when a dead body is discovered at the bottom of a cliff, but then she gets a bad case of the moist britches when she’s teamed up (as a consultant) with the handsome new detective. Father Brown it’s not.

As far as mysteries go, MYSTERY 101 is pretty weak and you’d have to be a goddamn moron to not figure out the killer within the first act. That said, I still enjoyed it and look forward to watching more of the series. I mean hell, I’m on like my 7th or 8th Depression-fueled run of Midsomer Murders, so I need something new to watch. At least once.

Okay acting, zero nudity, pretty looking scenery and a cute town, yet another Hallmark movie with a dude wearing a horrible jacket, no real ups or downs, one odd transitional moment around 28:37 (on the DVD) that made it seem like a scene was missing, an interesting cast (including the vice principal from SUMMER SCHOOL as Amy’s dad), good pace that kept the story moving forward, zero gore, zero tension, multiple scenes of people drinking coffee.

I don't know, I probably have more to say but I'm too depressed to figure out what it is. I think I'm going to go take a nap for a thousand years.

Part 2 - Mystery 101: Playing Dead (2019)
Part 3 - Mystery 101: Words Can Kill (2019)
Part 4 - Mystery 101: Dead Talk (2019)
Part 5 - Mystery 101: An Education in Murder (2020)
Part 6 - Mystery 101: Killer Timing (2021)
Part 7 - Mystery 101: Deadly History (2021)