At Home in Mitford

How could Hallmark miss the mark of this wonderful, redemptive story so badly???!!! Why are you trying to be like every other shallow love story? The story is so much more. The book(s) is about an aging circa 60 year, balding, pudgy Episcopal priest and a 50-something wife finding each other and healing and redemption multiplied. The book's story stands on it's own and doesn't need tampering in the slightest. You left out some of the most beloved characters. No wonder Jan Karon was so hesitant to release the rights. I'm certain her worst fears were realized. PLEASE don't make a sequel.

Welcome to Mitford, a town so small "the country club" is referred to as just that. There's one bookstore, one church, one realtor, and endlessly sunny days where the sun still shines even after a dinner date. Welcome to Mitford, a town so small that two women spend their morning gossiping about why one woman arrived unannounced at a man's house and wasn't introduced to the other woman sitting in his living room. "That's...odd." "That's what I thought!" Welcome to Mitford, a town so small no one has any secrets for long, proving to be the perfect place for a big-city writer to go to when she has writer's block.

Andie MacDowell leaves Boston for a stay in her uncle's country house to help her write her next children's book. Her next door neighbor is Cameron Mathison, the ridiculously perfect Episcopalian priest with absolutely no flaws. He might be one of the most perfect Hallmark heroes ever, which is saying something. If you're not in the mood for something so corny and unrealistic, you might want to put this one on hold for a while. He's handsome, fit, good with kids, caring with animals, handy around the house, keeps a clean house, has good fashion sense, endless patience with listening to people's problems, gives gentle advice just at the moment someone needs it, never loses his temper and speaks so soothingly he could put the most agitated person to sleep, talks about his feelings easily, and rides a motorcycle. Anything else? Oh yeah, his idea of a problem is spilling club soda on his outfit.

If you're at all worried about Cam and Andie's budding romance, you should remind yourself that this is a Hallmark movie. If you're still worried, here's your guarantee: Immediately after the rival love interest, Ken Tremblett, staggers from the house, sneezing because of his allergy to Andie's cat, Cam smiles and tells Andie and the audience, "I love cats!"

The good news is if you've had a really bad day and want to watch a movie where everyone's problems get resolved, you can pop this Hallmark romance in and have a wonderful stress-free evening. At my house, the Hallmark channel is on for three weeks straight in December, so sometimes, these movies come in handy. You'll also get an enormous amount of eye candy. Cam is handsome and clean cut, Andie is breathtakingly beautiful, and Andie's ragdoll kitty is so precious.

The movie itself was good, better than a lot of the Hallmark movies because of the actors and the storyline. There was one big problem though! Why did they call it At Home in Mitford? They could have titled it anything else and called the characters different names and it would have just been a good Hallmark movie. It was nothing like the Jan Karon books, which I loved, and which everyone else pointed out. I can't believe anyone signed off on that representing her work.

The book source for this story is awesome providing so much to work and the movie showcases a beautiful dog and cat to add adorableness but this movie was a bit irritating in its shallowness and didn't take full advantage of its assets including the talented cast.

It did however improve as the movie progress (and the relationship developed)

I haven't read the book to compare it to, but the story arc was standard with some interesting characters and a beautiful setting. I expected a little more from a movie made in 2017, but I can't grasp exactly what was missing, though.