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Holiday TV Movies & (Non-Rankin Bass) Holiday Specials - General Discussion


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(edited)
On 6/17/2019 at 7:52 PM, Irlandesa said:

Hallmark Movies & Mysteries is advertising two weeks.  I think what is throwing me off is that Hallmark is doing two weeks and Hallmark Movies and Mysteries is doing two weeks but those weeks aren't the same two weeks.  They only overlap two days.

That's how it was last year too.  In the past, Christmas movies were shown on each channel at the same time in July -- 10 days each, but concurrently.   Eventually Hallmark decided to stagger HMM's Gold Crown Christmas and Hallmark Channel's Christmas Keepsake events instead of running them at the same time.   The staggering meant that they'd overlap for a Fri-Sat-Sun or whatever, if Gold Crown wound down on the same weekend that Christmas Keepsake got started.  

At some point Hallmark then decided to extend the length of both Gold Crown and Christmas Keepsake beyond 10 days so that when they are staggered now, between the two events the whole month is covered.   

And then there is also "Jingle in July" on the Hallmark Movies Now streaming service, which only covered a small part of July in 2018, but now is spanning the whole month, with different Christmas movies added into the rotation each week, I think.

Edited by TVFan17
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(edited)

I was watching or half-watching something on Lifetime yesterday, and was surprised to see a promo for Christmas movies that are airing for one day -- this upcoming Friday, June 28th!!  (I don't think it's any coincidence that they are doing this on the same day that the Hallmark Movies & Mysteries Channel kicks off its Gold Crown Christmas event! lol) 

Edited to add:   For some reason, I completely missed the earlier comment in this thread about Lifetime airing Christmas movies  -- but I just saw it today after I posted this.

From what I can tell, the Christmas movies are only on Lifetime on 6/28 so far, and into the wee hours of 6/29, but I would not be surprised if they add in another random day of Christmas movies in July.

The line-up appears to be:

8 a.m. -- A Gift Wrapped Christmas

10 a.m. -- The Christmas Contract

12 p.m. -- Poinsettias for Christmas

2 p.m. -- My Christmas Inn

4 p.m. -- The Flight Before Christmas

6 p.m. -- A Christmas in Tennessee a.k.a. A Smoky Mountain Christmas

8 p.m. -- Elf

10 p.m. -- Elf

12:01 a.m. -- Elf

2:04 a.m. -- Elf

Here is the link to the schedule page -- https://www.mylifetime.com/schedule?month=6&day=28&year=2019

Edited by TVFan17
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33 minutes ago, MikaelaArsenault said:

So the movie channel is only two weeks?

It looks like it. I think they're going to start on Thursday, as they've been airing a movie every Thursday this year, and if the other channel is going to start their marathon on the 12th, that's right in line with the movie channel finishing up.

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11 hours ago, Camille said:

This is a rather amusing Huffington Post article about the myriad of fictitious countries featured in these royal-themed movies: 

https://www.google.com/amp/s/m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5c1d0ab7e4b05c88b6f80ab3/amp

On the really, really outside chance that I'm not the only one with a device so old that the link above is blocked, use this one: huffpost.com/entry/fake-european-countries-of-royal-romantic-comedies_n_5c1d0ab7e4b05c88b6f80ab3

Anyway, the town adjacent to my low-rent apartment (and whose zip code I ironically share) has neighborhoods of homes and estates valued at upwards of $1 mil. and built in the 19th century. At Christmas it literally looks like a post card. And yes, pretty much everyone is blonde, although there's always been a little sprinkling of diversity (e.g., Mr. T used to live here). 
So they really should film a royal-themed, Christmas movie here.
And if it was the property owners (rather than the city) who would be paid for the use of their estates, maybe they could be talked into donating the proceeds to the adjacent minority communities for a tax write-off. 

(edited)

Hallmark is notorious for changing showtimes and adding to/removing movies from their assorted seasonal schedules, sometimes on very short notice, so consider these schedules to be tentative:

Hallmark Movies & Mysteries Channel's Gold Crown Christmas event (June 28th -- early July 15th schedule) --

https://www.hallmarkmoviesandmysteries.com/christmas-in-july/gold-crown-christmas-2019

Hallmark Channel's Christmas Keepsake event schedule (July 12th - July 28th) -- 

https://www.hallmarkchannel.com/christmas-in-july/christmas-keepsake-schedule-2019

There was supposed to be a new movie airing on the Hallmark Channel on July 13th -- called "A Merry Christmas Match" -- but it was removed from the schedule one or two weeks ago.   

However, "Christmas Camp" is still scheduled to premiere on the Hallmark Movies & Mysteries Channel on Thursday, July 11th.

Edited by TVFan17
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(edited)

It has begun.

Bwah.

That sounds rather ominous, doesn't it?

It's amusing--in a Black Comedy sense--how Hallmark's Christmas In July marathon has become almost as much a phenomenon as their actual Christmastime marathon--Christmas Creep by starting earlier each year and including a few movies that instead of being reruns, were actually specifically filmed for this event.

Edited by Camille
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6 hours ago, TVFan17 said:

Lifetime, coming at you in October, with Christmas 24/7.  Huh??    They are going hard after Hallmark, I guess --

http://itsawonderfulmovie.blogspot.com/2019/06/lifetime-announces-christmas-tv-movies-coming-2019.html

Let the insanity begin. 🙄

In related news, did anyone else get an email from the New York City Ballet (or whatever your local ballet is) about how they should buy their tickets to The Nutcracker NOW?!

(edited)

I think that there should be at least one person who is from a place mentioned in a movie that reviews the script for accuracy.  I have lived most of my life in the Boston suburbs and have some nitpicks with Christmas Camp.  It was originally said that Christmas Camp was 2 hours west of Boston.  That would put it just outside of the Berkshires, but I'm going to assume that the story took place in the Berkshires.  But then later Haley told her friend/assistant that she was going "upstate."  Maybe there's an upstate in NY, but not in Massachusetts.  Here we say, "Western Mass" or "the Berkshires."  No one, I repeat, no one, ever says "upstate."  My next quibble is that characters kept saying that they were going to "the city," meaning Boston.  UGH!  Look on a map.  The Berkshires (btw pronounced "berk-sures") is almost equidistant from Boston and NYC.  If you are in the Berkshires and you say "the city" it means NYC.  For some reason, people here say, "I'm going in to town" when they mean Boston.  I'm not sure if people in the Berkshires would say "in to town," but they wouldn't call Boston "the city."

Another few random comments on Christmas Camp.

- Who ever did Haley's makeup did her a disservice.  The smokey eyeshadow made her eyes look sunken so she looked ill.

- Am I the only one who remembers when John James was a heart throb?  

- I just can't get into Bobby Campo being a romantic lead.  Once again I'm showing my age.  He reminds me too much of Martin Short.

And now I'm going to sound like the attorney that I am.  I just don't get franchising Christmas Camp.  In order to do that they need to have something proprietary.  The first thing that should have been done, before approaching any other places, was to Register the name "Christmas Camp."  I'm not even sure if the Trade Mark office would accept such a generic name.  Why would anyone pay to set up a Christmas camp when they can just send someone there for a week to get information and then set up their own?

And by now you probably think that I didn't like the movie.  But I actually did enjoy it.  Was it because it was a new Christmas movie in July?  Was it because I like John Jame's voice? Was it because I've stopped caring that people have snowball fights with their bare hands and no steam comes out of their mouths?  Was it because the leads were actually likable?  I have no idea.  All that I know is that I thought it was cute and fun.  And I want to go to Christmas Camp (and I'm Jewish).

Edited by ShelleySue
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On 7/12/2019 at 9:17 AM, ShelleySue said:

- Am I the only one who remembers when John James was a heart throb?  

I only lasted half an hour into the movie; it was just too cheesy for me, and I didn't like the lead actress at all.

For that half hour, though, I kept staring at John James (I hadn't seen the names of who was in the movie), and I couldn't figure out why I knew him (because you're not the only one who remembers those days). I called my husband out to see if he'd recognize him, and he didn't--which is funny, because he was a huge Dynasty fan back in the day; he had the hots for the Fallon actress. So finally, I went online and let out a shout: "OHMYGOD THAT'S JEFF FROM DYNASTY!" 

I should have known from the voice, which I always loved, but I didn't because I'm old, too, and...well, the memory goes. It was nice to see him again; just wish he had been in a better movie. 

(edited)
7 hours ago, MikaelaArsenault said:

I see that Hallmark Channel has already started showing their Christmas In July movies.

Wonder when that started?

Well, it is July, so there's no better time to show Christmas in July movies, I guess!  lol 

This year the movies on the Hallmark Channel began on Friday, 7/12.  The ones on the Hallmark Movies & Mysteries Channel are wrapping up early tomorrow morning, after starting in late June.

Hallmark has been doing Christmas in July marathons for years, but the schedules have changed in different ways in the time that has passed.   Each channel used to run its movies concurrently over a 10-day period, but then they began a staggered schedule 2 or 3 years ago, and they eventually extended the event on each channel to be a bit longer than it used to be.  So now, between Gold Crown Christmas on HMM and Christmas Keepsake on HC, they span the whole month of July because of the way they are staggered -- 2 weeks on one channel, and 2 weeks on the other channel.  Each channel has a different line-up of movies.

They also have 90 Christmas movies available on the Hallmark Movies Now streaming service this month as well.

Edited by TVFan17
typo!
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1 hour ago, TVFan17 said:

Well, it is July, so there's no better time to show Christmas in July movies, I guess!  lol 

This year the movies on the Hallmark Channel began on Friday, 7/12.  The ones on the Hallmark Movies & Mysteries Channel are wrapping up early tomorrow morning, after starting in late June.

Hallmark has been doing Christmas in July marathons for years, but the schedules have changed in different ways in the time that has passes.   Each channel used to run its movies concurrently over a 10-day period, but then they began a staggered schedule 2 or 3 years ago, and they eventually extended the event on each channel to be a bit longer than it used to be.  So now, between Gold Crown Christmas on HMM and Christmas Keepsake on HC, they span the whole month of July because of the way they are staggered -- 2 weeks on one channel, and 2 weeks on the other channel.  Each channel has a different line-up of movies.

They also have 90 Christmas movies available on the Hallmark Movies Now streaming service this month as well.

Thank you.

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(edited)

Remember the year -- maybe just 3 years ago or so -- when Lifetime premiered only ONE new Christmas movie (I think it was called Heaven Sent or something like that)??

Those days are gone.  So not only did Lifetime recently announce that they would be starting their Christmas programming in October, now they have revealed how many new movies we can expect from them.  I guess this is a great alternative for people who can't stand Hallmark Christmas movies but love Lifetime Christmas movies. 

Only 2 of the 28 are named here, but lots of others have been filmed or will be filmed soon.

https://ew.com/tv/2019/07/15/lifetime-28-christmas-movies-melissa-joan-hart-tia-mowry-hardrict/

Edited by TVFan17
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5 hours ago, TVFan17 said:

Remember the year -- maybe just 3 years ago or so -- when Lifetime premiered only ONE new Christmas movie (I think it was called Heaven Sent or something like that)??

Those days are gone.  So not only did Lifetime recently announce that they would be starting their Christmas programming in October, now they have revealed how many new movies we can expect from them.  I guess this is a great alternative for people who can't stand Hallmark Christmas movies but love Lifetime Christmas movies. 

Only 2 of the 28 are named here, but lots of others have been filmed or will be filmed soon.

https://ew.com/tv/2019/07/15/lifetime-28-christmas-movies-melissa-joan-hart-tia-mowry-hardrict/

So that’s 68 new movies just on Hallmark and Lifetime. That’s insane. 

Netflix has announced 3 so far and ABC is making one with Lea Michele. 

11 hours ago, LexieLily said:

That is the sound of our DVRs weeping under the strain.

Not mine. I don't hate these movies, but there's only three of them that really like. They're basically all the same. At most, I might just have them on as background noise, but I rarely sit down to actively watch.

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15 hours ago, Dani said:

So that’s 68 new movies just on Hallmark and Lifetime. That’s insane. 

Netflix has announced 3 so far and ABC is making one with Lea Michele. 

I think that 68 (not even counting what airs on other networks such as UP and ION) is a lot to handle for most people -- especially since, at the end of the day, while there are some differences between some Lifetime movies and Hallmark movies, many of them are very similar in many ways.   Some Lifetime movies could easily be mistaken for Hallmark movies, and vice versa.   Not all of them, but some.   Those similarities make it more difficult for casual viewers to figure out which movie aired on which network if they can't quite recall where they saw something and where they need to go to see it again.  

Netflix is kind of tricky to figure out.   They do things a bit differently with their scheduling.

For example, if Hallmark films a Christmas movie this year -- anytime from January into mid-November -- it will premiere this year.  They usually do not shoot their Christmas movies the year before they air (although Christmas Camp, which was a movie they acquired, just premiered last week even though it was actually filmed one full year ago).  So you know that anything Christmasy they shoot this year will air this year, as long as it is a made-for-Hallmark movie.  

Same thing with Lifetime -- if Lifetime films Christmas movies this year, they will air them this coming holiday season.

Netflix, on the other hand, seems to bank a few movies here and there.  They shoot things way in advance and they don't premiere all of them in the same year they're filmed.   They actually have many more Christmas movies lined up than those 3 referenced in the article -- including one filmed in 2018, in Africa, starring Kristin Davis and Rob Lowe -- but they will probably bank some of them and air them next year.  It's hard to know exactly how many they will premiere this holiday season and how many they will hold onto until 2020.  But they've got a bunch of them in various stages of production.

In fact, before Hallmark's productions and Lifetime's productions really picked up steam this year, I was already seeing early signs of Netflix Christmas movies going into production.  Netflix was making progress on their Christmas movie shoots early on in 2019, but, again, we might not see most of those until next year or some other year.

On July 15, 2019 at 10:19 PM, Camille said:

What's the difference?

The Hallmark movies stick to more of a formula.  I forgot who said it, so I'm sorry I'm not giving credit where credit is due, but Hallmark movies are like MadLibs.  You fill in the blanks with big city/small town.  One person in the couple is a workaholic, the other is laid back.  Etc.

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6 hours ago, ShelleySue said:

The Hallmark movies stick to more of a formula.  I forgot who said it, so I'm sorry I'm not giving credit where credit is due, but Hallmark movies are like MadLibs.  You fill in the blanks with big city/small town.  One person in the couple is a workaholic, the other is laid back.  Etc.

The MadLibs comparison is so accurate. I also think Lifetime movies tend to be less sanitized.

I’m a big reader so I consider Hallmark to be the Harlequin novels of romance movies. They’re safe and predictable so you know it’s going to be a decent story. Lifetime has the potential to better but they also have the potential to be much, much worse. 

8 minutes ago, Dani said:

I’m a big reader so I consider Hallmark to be the Harlequin novels of romance movies. They’re safe and predictable so you know it’s going to be a decent story. 

I call Harlequin my palate cleanser between my other books.  Hallmark fills the same purpose for me.

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(edited)

Last year, instead of binge watching every holiday movie, I decided to try something different.  I DVRed a bunch of Lifetime movies.  My plan was to watch them during the Christmas in July promotions.  So instead of watching movies I'd already seen, I would be watching movies that were new to me.  It's actually working wonderfully and I'd recommend it to anyone who gets overwhelmed in November and December with all of the new movies.

Even though it was not new in 2018 I DVRed Flight Before Christmas and I watched it last night.  What does everyone think about it?  I thought it was horrible, but my husband, a man who usually hates these movies, liked it.  I thought that Stephanie (Mayim Bialik) was rude, obnoxious, self-absorbed and someone I wouldn't want to know.  On the other hand, Michael (Ryan McPartin) was a genuinely nice person.  I have no idea what he saw in Stephanie other than she pointed out the truth to him.  My husband, on the other hand, thought that she was refreshing and appreciated it that she wasn't like the women in most of these movies are.

Edited by ShelleySue
typo

My tv diet consists mainly of ID channel, Big Brother, and Hallmark Christmas movies, so I like having Christmas in July! It gives me a mid-year break from all the dead people/true crime stuff.
Yesterday, I watched Snow Bride & The Most Wonderful Time of the Year - hadn't seen either of them before, but had heard good things (either here or in the Hallmark thread).  I loved them - and even watched a 2nd airing of MWTOTY today.  Last week I caught another favorite - Nine Lives of Christmas.  Soon, though, it will be back to homicides, kidnappings and forensics.  

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I assumed this would have already been posted here, but I don't see it.

Here is an EW article detailing  26 of the 28 new Lifetime Christmas movies coming this year, with tentative premiere dates, along with a bonus special featuring Lifetime Christmas movie stars --

https://ew.com/tv/schedule-all-28-new-lifetime-christmas-movies-2019/

The dates for all 28 are listed, but only 26 titles are given

I guess the other two unannounced movies will be revealed later -- which could mean they are acquisitions and not made-for-Lifetime movies, but who knows?

Corey Sevier somehow landed the lead role in TWO of the movies this year, unless my eyes are deceiving me or I am imagining things (which is not impossible!).

Edited by TVFan17
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45 minutes ago, TVFan17 said:

I assumed this would have already been posted here, but I don't see it.

Here is an EW article detailing  26 of the 28 new Lifetime Christmas movies coming this year, with tentative premiere dates, along with a bonus special featuring Lifetime Christmas movie stars --

https://ew.com/tv/schedule-all-28-new-lifetime-christmas-movies-2019/

The dates for all 28 are listed, but only 26 titles are given

I guess the other two unannounced movies will be revealed later -- which could mean they are acquisitions and not made-for-Lifetime movies, but who knows?

Just judging by the actors I’m more interested in Lifetime than Hallmark. Excited to see Meghan Hilty and Tiya Sicar back from last year. Marla Sokoloff, Katie LeClerc and Erin Karpluk back after large gaps. Ali Liebert back as a lead after Hallmark wasted her. Plus the supporting casts are impressive Michael Gross, Leslie Ann Warren, Dee Wallace, Patrick Duffy, and Jaclyn Smith among others.  Also Wallace from Veronica Mars.

57 minutes ago, TVFan17 said:

Corey Sevier somehow landed the lead role in TWO of the movies this year, unless my eyes are deceiving me or I am imagining things (which is not impossible!).

He is. It’s particularly weird because their premiering on back to back nights. 

15 minutes ago, Dani said:

Just judging by the actors I’m more interested in Lifetime than Hallmark. Excited to see Meghan Hilty and Tiya Sicar back from last year. Marla Sokoloff, Katie LeClerc and Erin Karpluk back after large gaps. Ali Liebert back as a lead after Hallmark wasted her. Plus the supporting casts are impressive Michael Gross, Leslie Ann Warren, Dee Wallace, Patrick Duffy, and Jaclyn Smith among others.  Also Wallace from Veronica Mars.

He is. It’s particularly weird because their premiering on back to back nights. 

I'm excited to see Patricia Richardson back from last year.

UP hasn't released their Christmas lineup yet but I did stumble across this one on IMDb which is a sequel to Last Year's movie

Christmas with a Prince - The Royal Wedding 

Its Christmas again and Dr Tasha is on her way to meet Prince Alexander in St. Savarre. Though this is a happy time it is also a very stressful as a treaty is being negotiated between St. Savarre and Vandelien.When Tasha arrives, Alex surprises her by asking for her hand in marriage. She accepts and they immediately begin planning the wedding. When Princess Miranda finds out she is not happy. She concocts a plan to put a halt to this fairy-tale. Will Miranda succeed or will Tasha have her happily ever after?

Edited by In2You
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It was reported by a site called Lolly Christmas that Jessica Lowndes (one of Hallmark's regular Christmas actresses) is actually doing a Lifetime Christmas movie this year.   She has done other non-Christmas Lifetime movies, but I think this might be her first Lifetime Christmas movie.   The one she is in is Rediscovering Christmas

Jessica hasn't left Hallmark -- they are airing a new Fall Harvest movie starring & written by her on September 21st -- but I guess Lifetime stole her away for Christmas this year.

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