Ep. 31 - AVMP Favorites

Amelia Hamilton is flying solo this week and recapping some of her favorites. Tune in!

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Now this is the FCB Podcast Network. Welcome back to a very merry podcast.
I'm your very merry host, AmeliaHamilton. This week, we do

(00:22):
not have a very merry co host. Kia is very very busy with some
stuff going on in her non ChristmasLand life. But we didn't want to
leave you without an episode, soI am going solo this time, and
instead of recapping a movie, andI'm going to tell you about some of
my favorites. One complaint that peoplehave about Christmas Land movies is that there
are only a few plots that theyuse over and over again with just a

(00:46):
little bit of difference. Well,Kia and I think that that is a
feature, not a bug. Welove it. So I'm going to go
through some of those plots and whichmy favorite are. For each of them,
i'll give you just a quick overviewof what they're about, what the
story is, and what tropes arein them. Now, for a lot
of them, we've already done anepisode, so I will let you know
and you can go back and listento those if you want the full recap.

(01:08):
Here we go. We are goingto start by talking about fake dating,
which is one of my favorites.They're pretending to date and you'll never
believe it, but they end upfalling in love for real. One of
my favorites with this plot line isan old one comes from twenty thirteen and
it is called Snowbride. It isGreta Kane played by Katrina Law is a

(01:33):
gossip reporter. She heard that oneof the sons of this very influential senator,
Senator Tannon Hills. She hears oneof his sons might be popping the
question over Christmas at their big Bearcompound, so she decides that she needs
to go get the scoop. Sheheads out to California and she has her

(01:55):
friend's wedding dress in the car.She ends up getting stuck in the snow
because she's dry in this ridiculous carand puts on the wedding dress like for
extra hormth I guess. So sheends up being found and rescued by this
handsome man who lives in a littlecabin. Turns out it is Ben Tannenhill,
one of the sons. He's playedby Jordan Belfi, who is a

(02:15):
very good Christmas Land actor anyway,and he just was hanging out in the
lodge because that's where he hangs out. It's his man cave. He has
his own guest house as a mancave. So at first she doesn't realize
it's him. Then she does andshe's like, oh, my goodness,
I have a scoop. This isgreat. But when they do their introductions,
she realizes that she can't give herreal name, Greta Kane, because
he might recognize that. Only sherealizes it a little too late after she's

(02:38):
already said Greta Kane, so sheway overcorrects to Greta Kane Abel Steinski,
and that is what she is knownas for the rest of the movie.
All right, Ben takes Greta backto the main family house where everybody's hanging
out, and his mom gets anhonorable mention here because Maggie Tannenhill is played
by Patricia Richardson and she is greatand I don't know why she's not the

(03:00):
mom in more of these movies.So they just get there. They're just
hanging out and his younger brother Jaredshows up and he is with his new
girlfriend, Claire Sinclair played by Hallmarkfavorite Susie Abramite. But plot twist,
she is a major socialite who usedto be really close to Ben. They

(03:21):
were dating, very serious, maybegetting married. It is quite the situation.
Well, Ben kind of panics seeinghis brother and his ex girlfriend all
loved up and introduces Greta Kane Abelesteinskias his girlfriend. So it is on.
As the movie goes on, ofcourse they start to actually fall in
love. You get a lot ofthe tropes. You know, they're really

(03:46):
both busy business people, too busyfor love. There's no precocious child.
Let's see. There is a contest. There's like a days there's like a
gingerbread contest thing, and the ClaireSinclair and Greta really fight over it.
So there's also a baking scene involvedwith all of that. There is decorating,
there's a misunderstanding that could have beeneasily resolved with one conversation, and

(04:11):
there's also a makeover slash dress revealat their big Christmas party. I will
not spoil the ending and tell youhow it all works out. You're just
gonna have to go watch it foryourself. But I think, well,
I hope by this point you canguess so. In that one. In
Snowbride, the deadline was a contest, but frequently there is some kind of
a work deadline or something else,you know, but it's got to get

(04:33):
done by Christmas. So one ofour recent favorites that had a big deadline
was Christmas at the Drive In.I think this was the first great American
one that Kia and I watched togetherfor the show, and it was starring
Danik mckeller and Neil Bledsoe. Tolisten to the full recap, it is
episode twenty three of a Very Merrypodcast. But Neil Bledsoe is back in

(04:55):
his small town. He's inherited thefamily drive in and he just wants to
close it down, put up somehigh rises, get that all done,
make some money, get out ofthere. Dannaka McKellar is also back from
her big city life. She's anattorney and she's teaching at the local community
college I think it's a community collegeanyway, at the local college, and
she thinks that the drive in isa huge benefit to the community. It

(05:18):
can't possibly close, so she getsher legal mind on it to try to
see if there's any way to stopit from closing. Of course, again
we get some forced proximity here.They're forced to hang out together, just
like in Snowbride, and they realizedthat there was also a misunderstanding that could
have been cleared up with one conversationthat led to their breakup a million years

(05:41):
ago. So we get some goodtropes again in this one. We've got,
like I said, we've got theforced proximity, We've got the Christmas
deadline, the importance of small towns, busy business people, too busy for
love. We had a baking scene. We've got a misunderstanding that could have
been cleared up with one conversation.We've got going back to your small town
and reconnecting with someone you haven't seenin a while. So really, this

(06:03):
one had it all and we lovedit. Since we did do a full
episode about it, I'm not goingto go into too much detail here,
but you can go back to episodetwenty three and listen again if you so
desire, or just go watch it. It was so good. This is
when we really felt like we hadfound some movies that were getting back to
the Christmas Land spirit when Hallmark wentoff track a little bit. All right,

(06:24):
I've mentioned forced proximity in the firsttwo movies I talked about, and
that is definitely a major plot pointin a lot of these, but my
absolute favorite Forced Proximity Christmas Land movie, and it might be my favorite Christmas
Land movie. I absolutely love itis the most wonderful time of the year,
and if you wonder how much Ilove it, it is the one

(06:45):
that I chose to talk about inour very first episode of a Very Merry
podcast. This one is from twothousand and eight, so at this point
I think we can just call ita classic. It is starring Brook Burns
as Jennifer Colin, who is ais the businesswoman. She is in market
research, which, as we know, is one of the jobs that exist
in Christmasland. She is a singlemom to a kind of precocious child,

(07:08):
but he doesn't fully realize the precociouschild trope in this movie. And her
uncle, Ralph, who's played byHenry Winkler, is coming for Christmas,
and as he's flying home, hegets to be friends with the guy sitting
next to him on the plane,Morgan, who is played by Warren Christie.

(07:28):
He is just connecting through New York. He's actually on his way to
Denver, but his flight is canceledhuge storms, so Henry Winkler just takes
him home to the house where Jenniferlives with her child, So that's something
that happens. He is a happy, go lucky, fly by the seat
of your pants chef. He travelsthe world, He cooks things, he

(07:50):
starts businesses, he goes on tothe next thing. It's his thing.
He's crazy. Henry Winkler uncle Ralphis a retired cop. So I guess
maybe they're safe. I don't know. It seems to odd, and she
thinks it's odd at first, butof course force proximity again. They get
to know each other, they getto like each other, and she is
dating a super boring, buttoned upman with expensive shoes. So there's the

(08:16):
whole tension there of her boyfriend andyou know, this new guy who's kind
of bringing her out of her shell, making her a little more fun.
But we also get a lot ofthe tropes we get I don't know,
I don't remember a baking scene,but we definitely get a cooking scene.
She is a terrible cook, butshe tries. At Christmas. We get

(08:39):
a Christmas tree decorating scene. Weget a falling off the ladder kind of
situation in here. We get alot of really good stuff. We got
like a nosy neighbor who's wonderful,um, you know, keeps bugging them
to put their lights up. Youcan't be the only dark house on Christmas,
she keeps saying. So Morgan getsout there and decorates, but he
puts up one red light bulb,and he makes it this whole story about

(09:03):
how there's this old tradition in Europeand they're just honoring that tradition. But
really it's just because he knows thatit's going to drive this annoying neighbor super
crazy to have one red light bulbon the street of all white lights.
So as things go along, youknow, Jennifers like, is Morgan ever

(09:24):
going home? The airports must beopened by now, And Henry Winkler has
DVRD the old weather report saying,oh, all the airports are closed in
Denver, and keep showing it tojen so that Morgan gets to stay one
more day, one more day.So it is it is pretty great.
And we get this hole running throughthe airport, you know, romantic situation

(09:45):
at the end, come back,it's all about you whatever. So just
really honestly good stuff. This issuch a solid movie. Came out in
two thousand and eight. I've probablywatched it every single year since and it
is just so good. So they'reyou go Force Proximity, showing us that
sometimes you need to give somebody achance. Okay, but what if you

(10:05):
spend a lot of time with someoneand you get to know them and you
fall in love and then you findout that they are not who you thought
they were They were keeping a big, huge secret. Well, secret identities
are another one of the plot devicesthat I absolutely adore. Obviously, one
of our favorites in that vein wasFive Star Christmas, and that is the

(10:26):
one that introduced us to Hot Sassafras. So in this one, we have
Bethany Joy Lenz playing Lucy Ralston andshe heads up to her dad's house her
I think her mom has passed away, and they head up to her dad's
for a family Christmas. It's herchildhood home and she's excited to go back.
And on the way up there,she stops at the local general store
and meets this handsome man, VictorWebster, and they fight over the last

(10:52):
Sassafras candy cane. Now, whenI say fight, they actually have a
trivia contest to see who knows themost about asafras and candy canes and sassafras
candy canes. He wins, buthe lets her have the candy cane.
What a guy. So she getsto her house and finds out that her
dad has actually, surprised turned itinto a bed and breakfast and nobody knew

(11:16):
this. So she's got her grandpathere, her sister who has just dropped
out of college, her brother,who I think does something tech related,
and her brother's wife, her sisterin law who has a beauty blog.
So they have just decided that theycan work from anywhere and they're going to
They are going to travel the world, but first they have to get through

(11:39):
this weekend because guess what, therehave never been any guests, and now
there's a guest, and they arepretty sure that it is this famous travel
writer and if she has a goodreview of your bed and breakfast, it
can make or break you. Butat the same time, hot Sassafrash shows
up. He needs a place tostay. He's a geologist. He needs
to explore something in the area toremember, but he is going to stay

(12:03):
there too, So the problem isthey need to pretend they actually are a
functioning bed and breakfast like with guests, because they're trying to impress this travel
writer. So she has to sortof trick Hot Sasafras into also thinking that
because he can't he can't know.Only the families in on it, so
they pretend that the sister is thechef, the brother and sister in law

(12:26):
are other guests. I think thegrandpa is a guest. Her grandma ends
up also showing up, and itis one of the best ensemble casts that
I've seen in a Christmas Land movie. It's absolutely hilarious. The secondary characters
are really not secondary. It's notlike when you get the black best friend
who has absolutely no interest outside ofthe main girl's love life. These are

(12:48):
all funny, three dimensional characters,laugh out loud hilarious. And of course
there's a twist because she comes cleanand tells Hot Sasafras that they are not
actually running a bed and breakfast afterthey start to fall for each other.
She just feels bad lying about it. But spoiler alert, coman etcha.
Hot Sassafras is actually the undercover travelwriter. The other lady was just a

(13:13):
guest, so that is one ofour absolute favorites, and that was episode
four of a Very Merry podcast.If you want to go back and listen
to the whole thing. It hada lot of the Christmas Land tropes in
it, but it was also reallydifferent because it was so funny. All
of the characters were, like Isaid, early, fleshed out and it
was just it was just really wellwritten. So another one that was also

(13:37):
very well written that I love withthe secret identity twist to it is Love
Always Santa, and I don't thinkwe've talked about that one on the show
before now. Before recording this,I would have thought that Love Always Santa
was maybe two or three years old, but it was from twenty sixteen,
so I guess I've seen it ahundred times. It is definitely one of
my favorites. When I go backto year after year, and it is

(14:00):
about Celia played by Marguerite Morrow,and I don't really know why she's not
in more Christmas LAMB movies because shewas delightful. So she and lives with
her daughter Lily, and they arewriting a letter to Santa. Celia has
been widowed for a few years,so the Christmas season has been kind of
rough and they're trying to get backinto the Christmas spirit writing a letter to

(14:20):
Santa. So on the other endof the letter is Jake played by Mike
Fayola, and he is a strugglingwriter who has absolute writer's block, and
so he just kind of took this, you know, this gig writing responses
to letters to Santa, and youknow, hoping to get the creative juices
flowing and do some good in themeantime. And he hangs out with these

(14:41):
older women that all like work atthe Santa letter place, I don't know,
and it's just great. So whenhe writes back to Lily as Santa,
he always signs his letters Love AlwaysSanta, hence the name of the
movie. So when he writes backto Lily, Lily's mom really likes the
letter and writes back to him andthey start a little correspondence. She just

(15:05):
knows that he's Santa. She doesn'tknow that he's Jake. Did Paul Revere
really say the British are coming?And how is George Washington chosen to leave
the First American Army? Join usfor the Growing Patriot Podcast, a place
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(15:28):
America's exceptional history. Subscribe to GrowingPatriots on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get
your podcasts Today. These days,it seems like everybody's talking, but no
one is actually listening to the thingsthey're saying. Critical thinking isn't dead,
but it's definitely low on oxygen.Join me Kira Davis on Just Listen to

(15:50):
Yourself every week as we reason throughissues big and small, critique our own
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radio podcast on Apple, on Spotify, iHeart, or wherever you get your
podcasts. So when Jake ends upcoming to their small town to do like

(16:12):
a meet the author author reading ata bookstore kind of thing, first of
all, everyone's shocked that this bigauthor is going to come, but he
really just wants to meet Celia andsee Lily and you know again, a
mix up that could have been clearedup with one conversation. He doesn't tell
her because he thinks that she's datingthis other dude that she's not really dating.

(16:33):
So he tries a couple of timesto tell her and then just decides
he's not going to because obviously she'sin love with this other guy that she
really is not interested in in theleast. Although he is a potato gun
aficionado, he's like on the potatogun circuit, he's building the best potato
gun you've ever seen. So hegets, of course, really close to

(16:53):
Lily and Celia, and they haveeverything in common, including travel and literature.
So Celia and her husband loved ErnestHemingway, so their little cafe is
called the Bun also Rises. Forexample, they have a side of pickles
istil in a jarro like kill Himanjaro. She really likes it when he gets

(17:15):
something to go and calls it amovable feast, which she had never thought
of. But it's a solid Hemmingwaypun, so she loves it anyway.
There obviously they keep falling for eachother. There are a couple of really
funny storylines going through this. Jakeis there with his agent, who does
not want to be there at all. He wants to get him to his
family. He's pretending he's all aboutbusiness, but he's a big softi inside

(17:36):
and he just wants to be withhis family. And then Lily, the
little girl, has this really cutething going where she has a crush on
Mike Sullivan, but she doesn't wantanyone to think that. She doesn't want
anyone knowing that she likes Mike Sullivan. But she does take Jake into her
confidence, and they talk about MikeSullivan quite a bit. At the same
time, she is a budding writer, so Jake agrees to look at her

(17:57):
stuff. He gives her all thisencouragement. He's just a right guy.
And through all of this, Jakeand Celia fall in love, but she
does not know that he is loveAlways Santa, And in fact, he
comes to find out that when shetalked about being interested in someone, she
was talking about Love Always Santa.She was not talking about the Potato gun
Man. So we get this adorablesuper Christmas land. He goes back for

(18:21):
her in a sleigh and Mike Sullivanlends them a snowmobile for the girls,
so they get to where they allgo after each other, and it is
adorable and sweet and so cute andfunny, and I just I hope that
we get another one like in twentyyears with Lily and Mike Sullivan coming back
to their hometown after their high schoolbreakup and finding each other again. That's

(18:42):
my dream. So obviously that onehas precocious kid also really really covered between
Lily and Mike. Okay, soin that one we have somebody who was
pretending to be Santa writing letters asSanta. The next movie I'm going to
tell you about has a woman whoaccidentally receives a letter to Santa from a

(19:03):
kid. And this is a classicfor the plot line a misunderstanding you could
have cleared up with one conversation.Another super early favorite of mine two th
elevens Dear Santa. This was aLifetime movie directed by Jason Priestley. By
the way, I want to getthat in there. So it stars Amy

(19:25):
Acker as Crystal Carruthers. Now youmight know her as Fred from the show
Angel if you are old likening.So Crystal Carruthers is this rich, socialite
girl. She never really does anything. She just shops and gets coffee and
does nothing with her friends all thetime. She's an only child and not
super close to her parents. Theyare always out gallivanting doing rich people things,

(19:48):
and this year they're on some islandor at some beach something for Christmas.
So they video call her and lether know that they're pretty tired of
just giving her money. She needsto actually make something of her life,
so she hasn't took Christmas to gether act together, or they will cancel
all of her credit cards, andshe is pretty horrified. She has no
idea how she's going to do this. She has no boyfriend, no job.

(20:10):
Her friends only spend money together,so that won't work. So she
goes for a walk to try tofigure out what she's going to do.
Meanwhile, we have Derek played byDavid Hayden Jones who you've seen in other
Christmas Land movies, and he runsa soup kitchen. He is a widower
and a single dad. I'm sureyou can't see the plot coming yet.

(20:30):
His daughter is seven year old Olivia. She writes a letter to Santa saying
that she wants for Christmas is anew wife for her dad. She thinks
it'll make her dad happier and she'sready for a mom figure in her life.
So, of course, while Cristelis out on her walk. The
letter blows away from the mailbox andends up at her feet. She can

(20:53):
see from the letter from the returnaddress that he works at a soup kitchen.
He does also have a snow plowingbusiness by the way, just see,
you know. So she goes downthere and says that she's going to
volunteer in the soup kitchen. Shejust kind of wants to see what these
people are all about and see ifshe can, you know, cheer them
up in some way. Obviously,she's never going to fall in love with

(21:14):
the soup kitchen guy. That's noteven on her radar, but she goes
down there. Of course they start. She's like a fish out of water.
Everything's crazy, but she starts tocare about the homeless people. She
and Derek become close. She andOlivia gets close. She takes her skating,
you know, they do all thisgirly stuff together. But here comes
another trope. Derek has a girlfriend, Jillian, and she is like busy

(21:37):
businesswoman, you know, but shethis is her man and nobody is moving
in on this, thank you verymuch. So we get stuff. We
get some funny things, like theykind of like angrily bake at each other
in the same kitchen, but tryingto prove that they're better, and they
just make a mess and everything's crazy. Olivia knows exactly what is going on
around here, and she is onteam Crystal. Of course, Derek is

(22:00):
an oblivious man and has no ideathat these women are like basically competing for
him. So we get a bunchof fun stuff. We get a good
dress revealed. There's a Christmas partyand Crystal is tricked by the mean girlfriend
into a way over dressing. Butshe's just like, whatever, I look
good and she just goes with it. She starts to just kind of roll

(22:21):
with the punches better, she loosensup. Derek is having fun with her,
Olivia is completely into it, sothings are going pretty well. But
then here we go here some spoilers. We find out that the soup kitchen
is actually going to close before Christmasbecause he owes the bank ten thousand dollars,
so eviction it's over. Meanwhile,Cristel realizes that she didn't just show

(22:47):
up, that Crystal didn't just showup here. She found the letter and
sort of stalked them a little bit, which I mean fair, she really
did. She tells Derek that everything'sbeen alive. This was just some creepy
lady. Derek is upset, justifiably. He kind of kicks Crystal out of
his life. She's gone terrible,calls her a liar, which you know
she was all right. Also,just as a random coincidence, Crystal has

(23:15):
gotten one last check from her parents. They sent her ten thousand dollars as
their final gift to her, andthey told her, you know you're not
turning your life around. Here's alast ten thousand dollars to you know,
start your life's with something else.I don't know, start a business,
invest it, do something. Butthis is the last of it. But
of course she uses it and shepays back the bank to keep the soup

(23:36):
kitchen open. So Derek, it'sChristmas Eve, of course, Christmas Eve
eviction deadline, which I'm sure happensnever he comes a soup kitchen, you
know, getting you know, toclose it down, and he finds out
that it's all been paid. Thingsare great, goes home to tell Olivia
and she is missing. Crystal goesto the town Christmas Tree and Olivia is

(23:56):
there, and just as she's comingclean to Olivia to tell her that she
found the letter to Santa and allof that. Derek finds them. They
have their hug, they have theirkiss, and one can only assume they
live happily ever after, even thoughthere was a misunderstanding that could have been
cleared up with one conversation. Soall of this talk about people pretending to

(24:18):
be someone they aren't, obviously isleading to the ultimate, the absolute peak
of that genre, which is theSecret Prince. There are a lot of
good Secret Prince movies, but oneof my favorites is the twenty twenty three
very recent Royal in Paradise from GreatAmerican Family, and that was episode twenty

(24:41):
five. If you want to goback and listen to it, we get
a whole episode on it. Andthis is the story of Olivia played by
Rhianne and Fish and Prince Alexander playedby Mitchell Burke. The two of them
meet briefly in New York, butshe doesn't know that he's a prince,
but he is in town princing he'sgot a speech or something that he's giving.
So then she has a horrible breakupand decides to go on this island

(25:03):
vacation with her best friend Katie who'splayed by Kara McCarthy, and I absolutely
loved her. By the way,Prince Alexander is going to the same island
because they have this aquatic rescue environmentalsomething that his dad was super into before
he passed away, so he hasto help with their gala and stuff that

(25:25):
they're planning. So of course thetwo of them keep running into each other
on the island. Her best friendKatie and his butler Winston played by David
Hooley, who is pretending just tobe his assistant. I think, you
know, they are definitely trying toget them together. He keeps Winston keeps
encouraging Prince Alexander to tell her thetruth, but he just wants to be

(25:49):
Alexander for a while. Katie's xshows up with a new girlfriend on this
trip. The whole thing is bananas, but it is really cute and really
funny. I loved the interactions betweenOlivia and Katie. They just they were
really funny and authentic, and again, it was a best friend character who
had some depth to her. Theydid some stuff that was super relatable.

(26:14):
They like hid behind the menu andargued over whether or not they were gonna,
you know, go on a picnicwith these guys all that stuff,
So of course we get the usual. Um, you know, he tries
to tell her at the last minute, but the Queen has found out that
he's interested in someone unsuitable and showsup at the gala, and you know,
somebody from the royal household tells herthat, you know, Alexander will

(26:34):
have to give up so much tobe with her, and she ready to
you know, not be herself anymoreto be with him, and blah blah
blah blah, there are more suitablewives. So she just leaves. She's
over it. And as she istalking about all of this with her publisher
because she's gonna write a story again, another writer's block, completely overcome by

(26:57):
Christmasland. And as she's telling thestory, the Queen knocks on her door
and everything is okay, They're allgoing to be fine. I still have
no idea where anybody's gonna live orwhat they're gonna do, but that is
not something that we worry about whenit comes to princes in Christmasland. I
did also want to mention another anhonorable mention, a runner up perhaps of

(27:21):
a recent prince movie. But thiswas not a secret prince and there's something
about a secret Prince. I hopeyou agree. And that was this year's
Winter Palace. That was episode twentyeight for us, And that was another
Danika McKellar and Neil Bledsoe vehicle.Dannika McKellar is watching over this chalet in

(27:41):
the mountains in America somewhere, andthe prince guy who his family owns it,
shows up, so they have herstay on as like a it's like
staff, I guess, just tomake sure everything's okay, you know,
And of course we get the usualstuff. You know. He's very stuffy,
she's super easy going, but theykind of, you know, she

(28:03):
lightens them up. They fall foreach other, there's a snowball fight.
He's got a secret artistic side thatshe helps him tap into. He realizes
that he can do his duty andyou know, still be fun whatever,
all those good things. So thatwas another cute prince movie. But if
we're going for a movie where theroyalty isn't secret, it absolutely has to

(28:26):
be a princess for Christmas. Thiswas another two eleven that those must have
been like the Golden Years for Hallmarkor something. So anyway, twenty eleven
Hallmark movie starring Katie McGrath as JewelsDay and she works at antique store.
She loves it. She is invaluablethere, but they don't have a ton

(28:48):
of money, so she is gettinglaid off at the end of the year.
And this is especially difficult because sheis raising her niece a nephew who
are Milo and Maddie, and theyare a little demons, especially Milo.
And also he talks like this andI don't know why, but that's just
that's just something that I don't know. I can't explain it. It's not
relevant to the plot, but butyou should know before you go into this.

(29:11):
So they are hanging out at theirapartment. Milo's gotten in trouble for
stealing something. They do the wholelike Nanny, too many studs in the
washer, you know, all thatkind of stuff. The neighbors won't watch
them anymore. But she has togo to work, but she's not actually
because she's losing her job. It'sa whole thing. So they this guy
comes to the door. His nameis I kid you not, Paisley winter

(29:33):
Bottom, and he is the secretaryor butler or something to Edward, the
Duke of Castleberry and I should pointout that it's spelled you know, castle
bu Ry, but they the Americansin the movie pronounce at Castleberry, So
just something to think about. Hehas played by Roger Moore, which I

(29:56):
find absolutely hilarious, and Paisley Winterbottomis bringing them plane tickets. So what
happened is her sister, Jules's sisterwas married to the son of this duke
and they died in a car crashI believe, you know, a couple

(30:17):
of years previous to this, andbasically because son of Duke whatever his name
was, I don't know if weever know married beneath him, that side
of the family has really never acknowledgedthe kids. But Paisley Winterbottom is here
with tickets and travel arrangements so thatthey can go meet Edward, the Duke

(30:38):
of Castleberry, and you know,connect with that side of the family and
they She doesn't want to go becauseher sister was so poorly treated by them,
but they don't really have anything elseto do for Christmas. It's a
huge opportunity and she doesn't really thinkit's fair to the kids not to go.
They really want to go. Soshe gets there and almost immediately and

(31:03):
of course it's the whole like Americanswho have never been outside of a subdivision
before, who have never been outsideof a normal whatever before they've they're acting
like lunatics running around this castle.And she runs into her her sister's husband's
brothers, so her brother in law, who is Ashton, Prince of Castlebury.

(31:26):
And there is some explanation as towhy he's a prince and his father's
a duke. I think it's fromhis mom's side. I don't know anyway.
So at Prince Ashton is played bySam Huan who if you watch Outlander,
that is Jamie Fraser. He gotvery famous after this movie, so
we got one Christmas Land movie outof him. Good thing it was a
prince movie, right, so youknow, of course everything's stuffy. They

(31:51):
don't want a tree in the house, they don't want baking, they don't
want this and that. All ofthose things end up happening. There is
dancing, but the sticky wicket here, if that's the right term. Is
Lady Arabella Marchan to du Bellemont,who is played by Charlotte Salt. Of
course she thinks that she is marryingPrince Ashton. Their parents have always arranged

(32:15):
this. They've known it was goingto happen for years. You know,
Ashton is like not into it,he's not in love with her, but
Jules just doesn't know what to do. Juels, you know, there's this
beautiful, elegant woman here. What'sgoing to happen this, This has a
lot going on. So again,not to be a spoiler, but it

(32:37):
does work out for Ashton and Jules. The kids are happy, Grandpa loves
them, and it all. Youknow, it's just it all works out
in the end. And that isa really good reason just to be upfront
about the fact that you're a prince. So for all the princes listening,
just email and let us know,like, you know, it's okay,
it's okay to be out and about. Let us know that you're a prince
who likes a very married podcast.Honestly, you're probably not the only one.

(33:00):
There's probably more than we think.Anyway, I will wrap things up.
You're probably tired of hearing me talkby myself with no Kira this week.
She will be back soon and wewill be back to our usual recaps
and general merriment. So I hopethat you agreed with these movies let me

(33:20):
know what your favorites are in allthese tropes. You can reach us at
a Very Merry podcast at gmail dotcom, a Very Merry podcast on Twitter
or I'm Sorry on Instagram and Facebook, and a Very Mary pod on Twitter.
So wagh in let us know whatyou think, what we left out,
what you agree with, and whatyou can't wait to watch next.
Until next time, Merry Christmas.This has been a presentation of the FCP

(33:54):
podcast Network, where Real Talk lives. Visit is online at FCB Podcasts dot
com. M