Early in November, Husband and I watched Mystery on Mistletoe Lane, a Hallmark movie we streamed through Peacock.
“On a scale of 1 to 5, how would you rate this one?” I said when the show ended.
“I give it a 3.5 because there was no murder,” he said. “How about you?”
“I say 3.7. It was just a treasure hunt and not that mysterious.”
“True.”
A plan ignited in my mind. I scurried to make a call.
“Let’s create a list of Hallmark Christmas movies we have to watch and compare notes on them later,” I said to my mother on the other end of the line. “We can rank them on a scale of 1 to 5.”
“This is great since I get the Hallmark Channel,” she said. “When do we start? And do I win if I watch more movies than you?”
“This isn’t a competition, Mom.” But I wondered if I could knock out a movie a day anyway if I really applied myself to the challenge.
We selected our first four movies. I chose Christmas Island for its somewhat creative airline plot, and Mom picked A Heidelberg Holiday because she liked German culture and once studied the language. We both went for My Norwegian Holiday to watch our heritage play out and Rescuing Christmas because it was filmed in Duluth.
My zeal flickered, however, when I noted that although Peacock showed Hallmark movies, it wasn’t as generous as the Hallmark Channel itself, which we didn’t have. While Mom enjoyed a sumptuous buffet of cinematic delights far away in her own home, Husband and I picked at a bunch of undelicious visual leftovers here at our place. And the uncertainty of what would air (and when) left us a little less Christmas spirity.
We had access to Christmas Island, the first movie I agreed to watch with Mom, but I dozed off in the middle of it one evening, and the next night when I set out to finish it, it wasn’t available anymore.
“What’s that about?” I said, perturbed. But like a distracted kid seeing her next package under the tree, I ripped on. I’d just have to wander off the list and explain to Mom later. “Ooh, let’s do A Bride for Christmas.”
When it was over, Husband delivered his assessment. “I give it a 2.5 because it wasn’t about Christmas, and that dog was out of control.”
I gave it a 4 for some reason I didn’t annotate, and we moved forward.
A Song for Christmas—a movie about a beleaguered farmer and a city girl/secret popstar—was next.
Husband rolled his eyes. “That manager, Russell, is getting on my last nerve—my last Christmas nerve.”
I gave the flick a 3, and Husband matched my answer, startling me with a higher score after his low review.
We declared My Norwegian Holiday accurate for celebratory rituals (I think there was even a kransekake, the traditional wedding cake, in there somewhere), and Husband voted a 4.6 to almost match my 4.8.
Spurred on by Scandinavian stories, we viewed Christmas As Usual on Netflix, following the uncomfortable interactions between a young woman’s Indian fiance and her Norwegian mother when she brought the guy home to Telemark for the holidays. Although bleak, the movie schooled us on yet another pre-Christmas Norwegian tradition to adopt: Bitte Lille Julaften, “Teeny Tiny Christmas Eve,” to be celebrated on December 22, a day before Lille Julaften.
I told a friend about the new-to-us holiday we planned to add to our calendar. “Now you’re just doing Hanukkah in disguise,” he said.
We blew through A Match Made at Christmas, which won an underwhelming 3 stars and zero notes from me, but Holiday Road hit me right in the feels. Weather forcing nine strangers on a road trip together across the country at Christmastime will do that to probably anyone, except Husband who was away for work and missed the excursion. I gave it a 4.9.
Five Star Christmas was notable for its first kiss between the main characters at the halfway point of the story. But why so early? We all expect The Smooch to come at the very end, in the falling snow, somewhere near midnight, a blinking star overhead, and with a jovial onlooker or two, but in the middle? No. That’s moving too fast, if you ask me. I gave it a 4.5 anyway.
Two weeks into December, Mom visited. I showed her my messy legal pad of movie scribblings. We had watched some of what I had told her we would and more of what I had never admitted to her we did. Husband had viewed numerous movies with me but missed a handful too, and I applied a rating to most of them but not all. My system was missing titles, poorly documented, and inconsistently scored.
“Wanna watch some more?” I asked her.
“Of course,” she said.
To finish off the season right, we paid $5.99 to access the Hallmark Channel through Amazon Prime, and Mom and I blazed through Rescuing Christmas and Jolly Good Christmas together.
If I could sum up my goal for chasing holiday movies through the last two months of the year, it comes down to two words: Mom time.
And really, that’s the end of my story.
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