Netflix HMU catchup. | Holiday 2021

I wanted to watch the other movies on the 2019 NHMU chart before I continued on watching any of the other 2020 or 2021 releases I hadn't watched. Those were Christmas Inheritance, Holiday Calendar, and Holiday in the Wild. Up next is scouring the rest of the Netflix holiday movie library. There are plenty movies that may or may not be part of the NHMU, but it's still pre-Christmas and that means the next few days will be spent binging. I am hereby no longer obligating myself to blog the Christmas/Holiday movies I will watch the rest of the season. I think I'll just tweet my frustrations.

Christmas Inheritance

Before ambitious heiress Ellen Langford can inherit her father's business, she must deliver a special Christmas card to her dad's former partner in Snow Falls. When a snowstorm strands her at the town inn, she discovers the true gift of Christmas.

- Like in K-dramas, where the sexier, better looking option, with all their jerky ways, gets passed up for the nice, kinder, less attractive option, who is generally much more emotional. Because lying about you're name as you're going incognito in an attempt to not be judged is not the same deception as your wife leaving you for her client Jake! 

The Holiday Calendar

A photographer discovers that the antique Advent calendar she inherited seems to predict her future, including a budding romance.

- I gotta say, I'm glad the romantic foil was taken out well before the two best friends got together. He was more attractive, more together - on paper at least. But how did he make the lead feel?! He put on a good show. In addition to A Princes Switch (2018) and The Knight Before Christmas (2019), this is one of the earliest movies in the NHMU (per the chart) to have a magical element, contested or not (it clearly is magical). Trying to figure out how the magic system might interplay is a whole other story however.

Holiday in the Wild

After her husband ends their marriage, Kate embarks on a solo second honeymoon in Africa. There, she and Derek, a pilot, rescue a baby elephant. While nursing the elephant back to health, Kate discovers how much she loves her new surroundings.

- In like the most "neutral" way possible, this is a white savior movie. White people can live out their colonial fantasies without having to deal with the lasting social and political impacts of colonialism, visiting not a specific country, but just "Africa!" Visit your country on the continent and do good - by helping the animals. Because why else would anyone vacation on the continent if not to live our their safari/wildlife reserve dreams? Okay. Solid CGI elephant though. Anyway, all that, but over a period of 4 months, because we had to hit Christmas. Also, why is the humble but extremely talented artist trope a thing? We did that in Christmas Inheritance already. But also, a marriage?! I liked that, I won't lie. Also, that was Rob Lowe's son?! Hmm.