Good cast, nicely done typical story
If you want realism, your in the wrong place. Actually, it's pretty easy to ignore the unrealistic parts unless one of them pushes personal buttons. I won't list them, but there's several.The premise is actually a combination of some other Christmas themes. Jackie goes to Alaska as almost a last job resort. There's never really a deadline, but the idea is still to save Finn's family business (newspaper). The newcomer makes an immediate, somewhat unrealistic impact. A small town changes a city girl.
The story is thin. I thought there was going to be some tension from a certain quarter, but it didn't turn out that way and as a result, the only tension was the future for the newspaper and Jackie. There's no great highs or lows and no real surprises. What might have been a twist was telegraphed clearly before it happened. The ending was pretty typical.
The appeal is a combination of chemistry between Carly Hughes and Rob Mayes plus the small town charm. Most of the cast, if not all, performed well. Movies where residents go out of their way to help their neighbors always appeal to me. Throw in a couple of nice BFF's and I'm hooked. One note about chemistry: the movie diluted Jackie and Finn's screen time with too much of the rest of the story. The time they had was good and there's some interesting activities - not just the formula ones in all Christmas movies.
Hughes sings a beautiful Christmas song, but it's short and embedded in the middle of the movie.
Pet peeve that doesn't affect my review or rating: please make phone texts large enough for anyone who doesn't have great vision or a huge screen. This one may be one of the hardest to read I've ever seen.
score 7/10
Jackbv123 18 November 2020
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw6282052/34938
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