Release Date: Saturday November 27 - 10pm
Movie: Time For Them To Come Home For Christmas
Network: Hallmark Movies & Mysteries
Starring: Jessy Schram and Brendan Penny.
Synopsis: During the holidays, a woman with amnesia catches a ride with her handsome nurse to investigate the only clue to her identity: a newspaper clipping for a Christmas Festival with a cryptic invitation.
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐1/2
⚠🛑 Disclaimer: This review may contain spoilers
Review:
So we have another installment of the "Time For ... To Come Home For Christmas" movies. This time with Jessy Schram, who I really like, and Brendan Perry, who is hit or miss with me. In general I'm not sure if the characters in these movies are supposed to intertwine as I have never seen any similarity outside of the name of the movie. They act as one off movies and this one is pretty much the same except for the excellent cameo from one of my favorites, none other than Allison Sweeney. So Sweeney is seen about halfway through when she loses her dog and our beloved lead actor/actress find the dog and deliver it to her. In her short cameo, and then follow up at the end, we find out that she is now married to Jack whom she fell for in "Time For You To Come Home For Christmas," and her son Will lives with them. She was on screen for a small amount of time but nevertheless I still love her.
Anyway, "Time For Them To Come Home For Christmas" is about Jane/Rebecca and Paul. We first meet Rebecca, although we don't know her name, when she is at a restaurant. She seems a bit down in the dumps. She leaves the restaurant and while walking with her luggage she is involved in an accident which finds her, and her belongings, thrown into the river. She is brought to the hospital and when she awakes she is found to have amnesia and they name her Jane. Now Jane (Schram) is being taking care of handsome nurse Paul (Penny) who seems to have issues of his own as he is reluctant to go home for Christmas. Anyway throughout a series of events Jane convinces Paul to go visit his family and he agrees to drive her to an event when she believes she was heading to and will possibly lead her to regain her memory and her family. Long story short, she regains her memory, he reconciles with his family, and they fall in love.
So this movie started out a bit slow in my opinion. It slowly gained some momentum and by the end of this I ended up really enjoying the movie. I do like a good amnesia plot so the fact that Jane ended up in a town and didn't know who she was...loved it. I liked her journey with Paul trying to discover where she came from. I loved all the flashbacks she got when she was having some memories. I admit I didn't know who the guy was in her memories until the very end so that was nice. I don't really like figuring it out too early in the movie so I was captivated by that and was surprised. What was with the sister? I thought she was a bit over the top with how mad she was at Rebecca in the first place. I wasn't quite sure how that caused such a rift and felt a bit cheated there as I had in mind there was some huge blowout that caused the issue. The brother in law had a lot more sense than his wife. I just wish he had spoken up a lot earlier than leaving it for over a year. It was kind of silly and seemed to be so rushed for a resolution by the end of the movie.
I know the movie was primarily about Jane and her amnesia, but can we talk about Paul's story-line? I loved that one ALOT and I was definitely a bit caught off guard when we found out that Ben, Paul's brother, had died a little while earlier and that this was what was keeping Paul from going home. I did not see that happening at all. I just thought there was some misunderstanding or the loss of a parent, which is typical, but I did not think that his story would revolve around the guilt that he had over not going home to see his brother who was dying. Wow.
So Jessy Schram was solid in this role which didn't surprise me at all. It was Brendan Penny who actually surprised me a ton. He was fabulous in the role of Paul. A man filled with immense regret over not going home for Christmas to see his dying brother. There were multiple scenes where Penny played Paul with such vulnerability and emotion and he had me in tears. The scene on the front stoop with Schram right after she found out about Ben...there were tears welling in Penny's eyes and I was a crying mess. His goodbye scene at the gravesite...bawling. Penny was so great in this movie.
As for chemistry between Paul and Jane/Rebecca...meh. I didn't feel it. To me it was a good friendship. Far more fitting as they just spent a few days travelling together so I don't know how love could come into the picture during that time. They were comfortable enough with each other and seemed just like good friends. Did I want them to declare their love for each other anyway? Of course...it is a love story after all and I am a sucker for a romance story.
An overall good movie with a good multiple plot story line and an emotional performance by Brendan Perry. Definitely worth the watch.
Did you watch this movie? Tell me your thoughts in the comments.
Komentar