(This piece is a version of one of the mailings of the weekly EL PAÍS Television newsletter, which comes out every Thursday. If you want to sign up, you can through this link).
Christmas films are a television tradition that has taken hold in recent years, especially since channels and platforms have realized the enormous attraction that these low-cost productions made in the same mold have. The stressed executive who returns to her hometown and regains faith in people and love. The children who discover that the old man who lives next door is actually Santa Claus. Those houses full of lights and decorations where the children of a family scattered across the country return. We know that everything will end well enough and that the next moment we will forget about the argument.
The calendar of the site specializing in television TVLine With all the Christmas movies coming out this year it gives an idea of the scale of the phenomenon. There it is clearly observed that there are American channels dedicated to these Christmas holidays. Hallmark Channel, for example, has 27 premieres of this television subgenre scheduled this year, according to data from TVLine. Their countdown to Christmas calendar began on October 17, with Christmas-themed films starting that day. All my life And it’s no different, with 12 new Christmas TV movies. In the total list there are 82 titles, most of them films, but also some series, such as the second season of Mistletoe murders AND The twelve dates of Christmaswith Mae Whitman (both in Hallmark).
What will be this year’s offer? On the one hand, Netflix has added to its catalog a flood of Hallmark stories which for weeks have occupied the top positions of the most watched films on the platform in Spain. To these titles are added the specific productions for each platform. One of the first premiered on Wednesday 5 November on Prime Video and is titled Finding Joy by Tyler Perry (your director’s name). This is a New York designer whose love will transform both her life and her professional career. Netflix began its series of self-produced releases on November 12 with An exceptional Christmas. Alicia Silverstone and Oliver Hudson play an estranged couple celebrating their last Christmas together before their divorce.
The Jonas Brothers are the protagonists of A very Jonas Brothers Christmas (Disney+), in which the three brothers try to travel to New York from London to arrive in time for the holiday season, but encounter numerous obstacles while performing their new songs. In The charm of champagne (Netflix), Minka Kelly and Tom Wozniczka fall in love in France. Apple TV premiered on November 21st Family plan 2starring Mark Wahlberg, Michelle Monaghan and Kit Harington and combining action and family with Christmas. In A very Christmassy robbery (November 26 on Netflix), two thieves played by Olivia Holt and Connor Swindells pull off a robbery at a mall on Christmas Eve.
Michelle Pfeiffer is the highlight of OH. What. fun (December 3 on Prime Video), in the role of a mother of a family who will live her own Christmas adventure. Joining the cast are Eva Longoria, Felicity Jones, Jason Schwartzman and Chloë Grace Moretz. In Santa’s Secret (December 3 on Netflix), one of the stars of the platform, Alexandra Breckenridge (A place to dream), plays a mother who works as Santa Claus at a resort.
There is also a Spanish representative, Christmas in your hands 2 (December 6 on Netflix), directed by Joaquín Monzón and starring Santiago Segura as Santa Claus and Ernesto Sevilla and Unax Hayden as a father and son who, together with some friends, will try to save him and thus save Christmas. and inside Merv (Dec. 10 on Prime Video), Zooey Deschanel and Charlie Cox play an estranged couple who try to cheer up their dog with a trip together and end up reconnecting.
Christmas movie production is an industry that exploded several years ago, before the pandemic, and is still at the peak of its growth. We’re talking about TV movies that cost less than two million dollars and are shot in two or three weeks (at least those on channels like Hallmark or Lifetime; the platforms have bigger budgets). They usually use fake snow because, due to the production cycle, they are normally rolled up in the summer period. Many are filmed in Canada (an estimated 75% of Hallmark Christmas movies are filmed there), which offers good tax incentives. And why are so many Christmas films produced every year? In this report of Vancouver Magazine They sum it up like this: They generate tons of money.
In Company interior In 2022 they published the story of Sandra L. Martin, a director who has directed and written several Christmas films for Hallmark and Lifetime, and told her experience. These companies give them a screenplay or book to turn into a movie and then it’s up to the person making it to find the locations and cast. “Christmas movies are an industry now, a booming industry. There’s a real hunger for them, but if you want someone like Hallmark or Lifetime to show them, they’re very strict about what they want to see. They’re afraid that audiences won’t want something new,” Martin said. This is why these films seem to be made of the same cloth: because in fact they are.
