Bria Lou Reviews

  It's Blogmas day 11! I chose this film mainly because the plot was slightly different than the movies that I've been watching so far, because the main couple start the movie as exes, rather than love interests. When Brie (Jessica Lowndes) is assigned her dream project at work, she is thrilled. Until she discovers that she has to work with her ex-boyfriend (Christopher Russell). So, while they start off as exes, this isn't a particularly original setting because after a while you forget that they were even exes in the first place. The characters have an interesting dynamic, particularly in the beginning of the time jump, when they meet each other again. You want to see where this is going to go. Speaking of the time jump,  it was too long (7 years) for me to really believe it. These characters look and act exactly the same, and they definitely don't behave as if they haven't seen each other in close to a decade. The characters were really bland, and the story itsel...

  It's Blogmas day 10! Today's pick is a Lifetime movie. I picked it because it looked exactly like a Lifetime Christmas movie, and I loved that. It's nice to change it up, but these movies are really what my Blogmas is all about. Erin (Tatyana Ali), a hotelier working in the city, has to return to her hometown to open a hotel that the town's residents are against. But when she decides to get the residents onside by turning the hotel into a Christmas hotel, she realises she will need the help of childhood crush Connor (Sean Patrick Thomas). I liked the premise of the film immediately. Not only did it feel somewhat realistic, but the fact that Christmas is tied up in every move this character makes causes the film to feel implicitly Christmassy. The love interests have natural chemistry, and their friendship/rivalry feels real. You really believe what they're saying. Even though the film is heavily based on business, it is also very much made in the spirit of Christm...

  It's Blogmas day 9! I picked this movie for Blogmas because not only did it sound different from the usual Christmas movies, but it also heavily hinted at being a musical (or music themed), and I love a Christmas musical. An estranged mother/daughter music duo, Bonnie Rose (Catherine Mary Stewart) and Ashlyn Rose (Beverley Mitchell) reunite after 10 years to release a Christmas single. As I've already said, this story sounded different from the other Christmas movies that I've been watching, and it was. And while it does make it clear that there will be a romance or two within the movie, that's not what it focuses on. My biggest problem with this film was that I didn't believe that our main characters were actually mother and daughter. They aren't believable, and their chemistry doesn't work. Speaking of chemistry, there also wasn't really any chemistry between the main character (Ashlyn Rose) and her love interest. To be honest, his character could ha...

  It's Blogmas day 8! This one enticed me because it felt slightly different from the usual Christmas movies I've been watching, in that, it wasn't about falling in love, it was about someone having to make a choice between love and their career. Lindsay (Eloise Mumford) has to make a choice between staying in her hometown to marry her boyfriend, or taking a job teaching at a prestigious college thousands of miles away. With the help of a mysterious stranger, she is transported 3 years into the future to help her make the decision. This film starts from an interesting place. It's not 100% clear what the plot will be because there are a few different routes that it could take. The film has an amazing cast, including Christopher Lloyd and William Shatner - one of the reasons that the film caught my eye in the first place was because of the cast. The downfall of plots like this is how long it takes the character to realise that they are in the future/past/a time loop, and ...

  It's Blogmas day 7! This film had been advertised by Netflix for a while before it came out, so it had been on my list for a while, and I was looking forward to seeing it. To escape a scandal, author Sophie Brown (Brooke Shields) goes to Scotland to visit the castle that her grandfather grew up in. What she doesn't expect is to clash with the castle's owner (Cary Elwes).   This was such a sweet, heartwarming story. It's so nice to see a romantic story about an older couple - we don't see it too often and it adds a new dynamic to an otherwise unoriginal story. There is such good tension and chemistry between the two main actors - their relationship (whether romantic or hostile) is always believable. The story outside of the romance isn't that interesting, but it is somewhat original, so it gets points for that.  I really like the characters that Sophie comes across and befriends. They round out the story really well. Even if the story isn't explicitly about...

  It's Blogmas Day 6! This is my first Blogmas film directly from the Lifetime website, and I chose it because I didn't really have an 'opposites attract' Christmas movie picked out, and this seemed like a cute one. When co-workers Jenna (Bethany Joy Lenz) and Kevin (Andrew Walker) volunteer for a Christmas assignment, they end up stranded in Santa Claus, Indiana. But as they become invested in saving a Christmas inn, will they discover that there's more to each other than they always thought?  Spoiler alert: yes. This is a really cute movie. The plot isn't really anything new, but as I said, I wanted to include at least one 'opposites attract' Christmas movie. The characters are obvious stereotypes, but I actually quite liked them. They are enjoyable to watch, and the actors did a great job with them. The actors also had good chemistry, which really helped.  In fact, the characters are a lot more interesting than the story itself. I for one didn't c...

  It's Blogmas day 5! These movies are now a tradition and I love it! I hope they keep making them for years to come! In this third instalment of The Princess Switch, when a royal artefact is stolen, Margaret (Vanessa Hudgens) and Stacy (Vanessa Hudgens) team up with Margaret's cousin Fiona (Vanessa Hudgens) to get it back. I look forward to seeing these characters every year. This film sees Fiona take the spotlight, with Stacy and Margaret taking a backseat. While I was intrigued by this new direction, Fiona was never a character that I cared about in the previous movies, so I didn't love that the story focused on her rather than the characters that I had already grown to love. The story itself is less compelling this time around. But because we are so familiar with this world, it doesn't matter that much what the story is. The film could have been shorter, and the story could definitely have been a lot more fun. It started to drag on after a while. It also doesn't...