Movie: Three Wise Men and a Baby
Starring: Paul Campbell, Tyler Hynes, Andrew Walker, Margaret Colin
Network: Hallmark Channel
Rating (out of 5 stars): ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Synopsis: Three brothers get the surprise of their lives when they are forced to work together and care for a baby over the holidays.
⚠🛑 Disclaimer: This review may contain movie spoilers
Review:
The most anticipated movie of the Hallmark Christmas season has aired and for me...it was good but honestly it didn't live up to the huge hype. I was a bit worried with all of the "sneak" peeks and all of the anticipation that it would fall flat. Now before you all throw rocks at me, I didn't say it was bad. It was good. One of the best of the season but it just wasn't as good as I expected it to be and I think it could have been elevated with a few changes.
First and foremost I wanted this movie to just play on the comedy. I didn't want a romance or any dramatic deep stories. We've had so much of that this season and I honestly just wanted these guys to be flat out comedic for the whole movie. Instead I got a bit of comedy, great acting by all leads, great supporting cast, unnecessary love stories and some missed opportunities. The deeper story that was portrayed on screen was phenomenal, I'll give them that, but I personally didn't want that. I wanted pure laughs and no tissues required.
Paul Campbell has an exceptional ability just to be funny. He really was made for comedy and he didn't disappoint. His looks, gestures, awkwardness and deadpan delivery of some lines had me laughing. His character Stephan had the strongest story behind it. I thought he was perfectly cast as the socially awkward pet therapist. His story with the love interest was the only one that made sense in the movie. I would have loved to delve more into his awkwardness around his love interest to be honest.
Tyler Hynes as the cocky youngest brother Taylor was great. His nonchalant attitude was perfectly portrayed on screen. Honestly this role was made for Tyler as it just screams his personality in general. The laid back, confident, cool guy. He plays that well. He in fact had some of the funniest moments on camera. His method of line delivery and comedic timing was fantastic. His looks, gestures, signs and pauses are all well thought out and add so much to the movie. The storyline with the ex-girlfriend and with him losing his job I thought was just unnecessary content that took time away from making his character and this movie better. His funniest moments were dealing with the baby. He also had a great onscreen dynamic with Paul Campbell. Wow. I would love to just see him and Paul Campbell just be let loose with a plot and ad lib their way through it. I think this would make for a memorable movie.
Andrew Campbell. I actually feel he played the role of the oldest and most stable brother well. Of the three, Andrew does come off as the more serious personality and the most stable so this role suited him. I actually thought he wasn't used enough and he particularly didn't have enough time on screen with the brothers. The love story for him and the firehouse stuff for me was totally unnecessary and didn't add anything to this movie.
The supporting cast in this movie for me was exceptional. Including Margaret Colin as the mother was a brilliant idea and she was phenomenal. The standout in this movie for me though was Fiona Vroom. I absolutely loved her. She was dynamite as Susie and her character meshed so well with the character of Stephan. Theirs was the only romance that I was interested in. I would love to see a movie of the two of them meeting and starting to date. I also really liked Matt Hamilton in the role of Mark. Although a bit obnoxious I actually found his character funny and he added some of the funnier moments in this movie.
Missed opportunities
Before I delve into some missed opportunities I want to say again that I did like this movie. Any critique I may have is purely from the standpoint of how I thought it could have been better. Alot of what I am writing are things that I actually was surprised weren't included.
The biggest missed opportunity for me was just letting this movie focus solely on the relationship between the brothers and how they deal with the baby. That's all you needed. You didn't need love stories, work issues etc. This movie would have worked 100% by letting them be brothers. They had an excellent dynamic together. Think of the shenanigans that could have arisen by things like the first diaper change, first feeding, creeping out of a room trying not to wake a baby, car seat dilemmas, personal time limitations...I could go on about so many other things.
The second thing I noticed were some scenes weren't long enough. The comedy was there is some moments but then just were gone too quickly. When Andrew Walker mixed up the babies...that could have been enough content to fill a whole movie with their panic and desperation to find the baby. Instead after commercial break the baby was found.
Two other examples of scenes cut short were the ice skating scene and the elf costumes. I was really looking forward to these two scenes in particular as we were blessed to have seen some behind the scenes footage through Tyler Hyne's Instagram posts. Honestly I laughed pretty hard at these videos he posted and was seriously disappointed when the ice skating wasn't even included in the movie and the elf costumes were only briefly on screen.
I'm going to stop here as I think some are going to think that my review is a little harsh. Don't get me wrong as I think this was a solid film and definitely in the top 5 this season. I think what happened was that the level of attention and expectation of this movie just had me picture something totally different than what surfaced on screen. On screen you still had a solid movie but I was expecting a true comedic gem and I didn't see that fully pan out.
Questions
You can't go ice skating because you forgot your gloves? Huh?
Final Thoughts
Paul Campbell, Tyler Hynes and Andrew Walker gave their all in this movie. It was funny and had surprisingly deep stories at times. It had a solid supporting cast and several laughable moments. It is definitely a movie you will watch every year. For me though I think the hype leading up to this movie made me anticipate something a little different than what was shown. I did enjoy the movie but I think that there were some missed opportunities that could have elevated this to a 5 star movie.
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