Santa Claus in July

Welcome to Santa Claus in July, my blog that honors our favorite Hallmark movies with plots that are as thin as our favorite elf in summer. This site is devoted to a tongue-in-cheek look at the dumbest set-ups in Hallmark history.

Filled with dry kisses, witty banter and sappy ever afters, Christmas movies have become comfort food for many. Premiers on Hallmark Channel often draw a larger audience than programs on major networks.

Given the volume the channels create every year, along with competition from Lifetime (It’s a Wonderful Lifetime), Netflix and the newest kid on the block, GAC Family TV, it’s inevitable that some plots will be a little thin.

Hallmark rarely strays from its formula for success, using the same actors, writers, directors and locations each season as well as recycled plotlines:

Feuding co-workers vying for the same promotion find animosity turns into attraction when they open up to each other;
Big City girl returns to small town where she grew up, reunites with her old high school flame and abandons the career she spent twenty years building to forge a new life with a guy she hasn’t seen since Senior Prom;
Bad Man of Business discovers the fetching woman he just met owns the family diner his faceless corporation plans to destroy to make room for more luxury condos or another upscale shopping center;
Two strangers thrown together to solve some sort of mystery find more than they bargained for.
An event planner must plan the event of the season or be fired. Her reward? A promotion. And her forever love.

Each movie features a “Meet Cute” moment that propels our hero and heroine on a journey to everlasting love. Along the way they lob snow balls at each other, build gingerbread houses and go ice skating before a completely avoidable misunderstanding temporarily drives them apart, setting up a dramatic reunion and the obligatory dry kiss.

Click the link below for a summary of each movie, along with a bonus prediction on what happened to our star-crossed couple.