Torrey Devitto is fast becoming one of my favorite Hallmark actresses. She's beautiful, talented, and often plays smart, strong, assertive women (loved her move at the very end). I enjoyed watching her in Rip in Time, The Christmas Promise and Write Before Christmas. Hallmark rookie Zane Holtz, who played Connor, was solid too.
I just watched a movie where extreme close-ups just didn't work. But here there is an extreme close-up of Torrey Devitto in an early kitchen scene and she just lights up the screen. In fairness, Holtz nailed his close up too with his line about "our kiss in Christmas Time Cupid was my favorite on screen kiss".
This was directed by Gary Yates who also directed some of my favorite Hallmark movies: Christmas by Starlight; On the 12th Date of Christmas; Once Upon a Christmas Miracle; Pearl in Paradise; A Dream of Christmas; A Bride for Christmas; and Taylor Cole's winter trilogy.
Richard Waugh, with his portrayal of Henry Livingston, Jr., and Shaun Austin-Olsen, with his portrayal of Clement Clark Moore were terrific. Truly outstanding. And the movie actually did a nice job of including a lot of the competing facts regarding the contested authorship of the famous poem (although the writer put his thumb on the scale at the end, presumably due to time constraints).
Amanda Barker is fun as B&B Edna who has a crush on Connor.
Sophie Bastelle did a great job with the thankless task of playing an actress who supposedly can't act (which was reminiscent of the set up in Bullets Over Broadway).
There are a lot of fun lines by writer C. Jay Cox, who also wrote Sweet Home Alabama, last year's great Hallmark movie Love Strikes Twice, and this year's wonderful Rip in Time:
When Conner walks into the theater for the first time, Hayley looks at him and says to Madison: "To what should my wondering eyes appear?" which is taken right from the poem for which the movie is named.
Hayley: "You said you'd let me know what Conner and you find"
Madison: "He's helping me do research"
Hayley: "Carrying your books to class?"
Madison: "Aren't you too busy for misguided innuendo?"
Hayley: "One should never be too busy for innuendo"
Madison: "Misguided"
Hayley: "You have your version, I have mine"
Madison: "I took this play to give myself a challenge, and Lena is a challenge"
Hayley: "I admire your affinity for understatement"
Connor: "She doesn't need to be Meryl Streep, she just needs to say her lines and not bump into the furniture"
Hayley: "And that marks the end of my 15 minute human interaction break"
And the exchanges between the "lawyers" and the witnesses were well written and well performed. The mock trial that the movie is based on is called "The Trial Before Christmas". It was written by Duncan Crary and Jack Casey and was first staged in Troy's historic downtown courthouse in 2013, and then again in 2014. But this movie, as with most Hallmark movies, was filmed in Canada.
I grade Hallmark movies on a curve, so this is an easy 10 for me.
