I met the author… a guy who wrote the script for one of the pictured movies. He was doing stand-up comedy on a cruise ship. He said yes, they are all terrible, but there’s a certain audience for them and they’re quite profitable.
He said I want you to think of me when you’re forced to watch one of these. I want you to know who is responsible, and that I’m very sorry.
They probably cost next to nothing to produce, so even a small audience will make them profitable.
I wonder, if you could just cycle through the same 5 movies without anyone noticing.
They have two movies that are the same exact movie but told through two different main characters point of view. Same scenes and everything.
It’s actually an interesting idea on paper. And Hallmark is probably the perfect way to do something like that.
It’s actually an interesting idea on paper.
I’m hearing an implied “but not on screen…”
They are definitely lower budget than ‘normal’ movies. But even as a low budget it still requires all the same production staff, camera, sound, editor, crew park staff, food services, wranglers, casting etc. The cheap part is unknown actors and not a lot of travel. Source: my wife has done background work on many movies and TV shows. As background they get paid to sit until call time. so scene maybe half hour, but all the background people waiting get a full hourly pay and all the food you want while waiting. You will notice on hallmark they zoom in tight so background is barely visible, this helps not having a large set of background people. in one movie at the mall they had my wife shopping and walking back and forth. it works for the scene but if you watched it closely you would notice the same lady in every scene carrying different boxes or bags.
It is kinda weird they haven’t made the Teletubbies decision to stop making new episodes once they have enough to loop. Once they have, what, three hundred? Then they can fill twelve hours per day from Halloween until Christmas. Shift those by a few movies every year and people will catch a whole different set based on when they watch TV.
Just once I want a man in a red sweater and a woman in a green dress [sobs].
Damn. Some very white Christmases in Hallmark land.
My mother and sister fucking looooove these movies, despite how low effort cookie cutter they are. My favorite game while they’re watching is “count the POC.” The last one we saw together, I got to 1.
I love to just have them on, in the background. These movies are self-aware. The Netflix equivalent has its own universe with internal references to each other, which includes fake countries, maps, etc. I’m no joke invested in the Netflix Christmas-verse or whatever the fuck.
Hallmark is a little less fun to watch, but still quality rubbish. Everyone knows it’s over the top. The actors, producers, and writers are all in on it. I’m not saying that makes them good. They are still bad. But when you watch them knowing the content is almost intentionally cringe, it’s a bit better. With a slight shift in perspective and perhaps a bit of squinting, you can see the Christmas overtures as nothing more than satire. Last year, one movie just threw in a vague reference to Santa. No beard. No glasses. Just a guy who wore a red coat and occasionally would get 1-3 seconds on camera breaking the fourth wall. He had like one line. No gifts. No reindeer. Never interacting with the Christmas Couple. Just essentially an old dude in red. To me, that’s the height of humor. It’s like they’re just wafting a single sprig of holly over the film in the editing room. I crack up every time.
The Hallmark movies are mostly filmed in one of the whitest basic beige towns in British Columbia. It would be difficult to find someone. They do have an east Asian population but it’s small.
If they ever need a black guy on set for whatever reason, give them my info
I like free food
they would never dare disrupt the cash cow with gays or queers, or atheists or ‘non christians’, or a realistic portrayal of a poor or homeless person, or too many brown persons.
Wealthy socialite Human Woman had it all, ceo of the top you feel bad magazine, house on top of building and even a tiny enslaved bark beast, the only thing Human Woman was missing was a chemical reaction.
Human Woman receives a electrical waveform, Human Woman’s Human Grandmother mush box has stopped, Human Woman emigrated in moving iron box to original location, meeting Human Man also from original location, chemical reaction happens and Human Woman And Human man become human Couple
You might enjoy “A Christmas Movie Christmas”, where the protagonists wake up and find themselves as the protagonists in a Christmas movie reality. It’s a comedy where you basically laugh at the troops while they call themselves out on it.
[Playful jokeness] The… troops? Whose military is invading Christmas-movie-land :o
The make you cry channel presents: Northern hemisphere winter solstice chemical reaction
Here’s a script idea:
Suzy Citygirl has to plan the perfect Christmas pageant or Bernard Bigbiz will fire her from her job at the Joyless Inc. Little does she know when she gets sent to Tinytown, Vermont on business she’ll meet Matty McSmall town. He owns the struggling local tinsel factory and needs to sell enough tinsel by Christmas or else his grandma won’t be allowed to have the surgery she needs to remove the tumor from her holiday spirt gland. Matty is also single dad that was widowed by a freak tinsel lathing accident and the little girl loves Sally Citygirl from the beginning and secretly helps her dad see past his pain.
With minutes to spare in the Christmas pageant/tumor deadline Suzy convinces Mr. Bigbiz to buy enough tinsel to save the Christmas pageant AND remove grandma’s tumor! But after throwing the perfect pageant she realizes Mr. Bigbiz is a terrible boss, and moves to Tinytown permanently. She falls in love with Matty, and gets a job at his tinsel factory. With her big business skills the struggling tinsel factory grows three sizes that day.
Mr. Bigbiz is ruined. He realizes the error of his ways and comes to Vermont to apologize. Now he too works at the tinsel factory, and loves life now. But don’t forget, throughout the movie the cast interacts with lovable bearded old man who may or may not be Santa, because wtf, why not?
