Frozen in Love (2018)

Best movie ever!

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

I can see reading other reviews that some love the movie, and others where kinda "mehh" about it. I am a single dad and usually watch these movies with my teen daughter. I have also reviewed several other Hallmark Christmas movies since I started getting hooked on them in 2016. Others in their reviews have outlined the plot so I shall not touch on that in my comments and instead focus on our impressions of the movie. Speaking for both of us, we really enjoyed this movie. We found it more realistic and relatable then many of the other hallmark holiday season themed movies and we thought the chemistry between the leads was great. I have never been a Rachel Cook fan, and even in this movie it took a bit of time to warm up to her, although at the end of the movie I thought she looked very pretty. On the other hand I have always really liked Niall Matter in these types of movies - he fits into the characters they have him portray very well and we thought he hit a home run in this movie. My daughter is reminding me we saw him as the lead in another Hallmark holiday movie last year which we also enjoyed.There were many occasions during the movie where we laughed, and otherwise we always had a smile on our faces. It was an enjoyable movie. I think most Hallmark fans would be charmed by this movie. We felt this movie deserved a very good rating. Please note we rate relative to the genre. For a Hallmark movie this was a home run, and so it gets a 9 in that context.

Rachael Leigh Cook was wonderful, as usual. She developed her character and actually gave her emotions that you could feel. The story was original, The writing was good, even most of the casting was good. Niall Matter is another story. He could be well cast as a best friend, cousin, brother, but NEVER EVER the male lead in a romance movie. He has played opposite several really good actresses always the same result. Absolutely no chemistry between them. He can skate, and read lines but his portrayal is flat and without feeling. The necessary chemistry is missing. Maybe Hallmark can use him in a mystery, but his performance in this one ruined what could have been a good movie. my score...1

Mary Cartwright is a dinosaur trying to run a brick and mortar book store. This movie is another of the overused my-store-is-in-trouble stories. And Mary refuses to consider doing anything to compete in the modern world of book selling. Meanwhile Adam Clayborn is a bad boy hockey player who needs to repair his image. The brilliant idea in this movie is to put the two together to help each other. Problem is they are totally oil and water. The first half of the movie focuses on the two themes - Mary vs Adam, and Mary as inflexible. At times the acting is exaggerated to emphasize these themes. I didn't care for it, but many people would enjoy the humor of the situations.About half way through, the two enemies start to learn things about each other which obviously is intended to change their points of view. They continue to rub each other the wrong way for a while, but it starts to look a little like flirting.I would have liked to see more of Adam and Mary and less whining about the store. The relationship doesn't sell on screen as much as it could.Seems to me that PR lady should have dropped a little hint to the hockey team management that someone might post on social media about Adam bailing on his commitment to the store especially after the giveaway at the game by the bookstore. Actually, it is totally unrealistic that Erica would have done that and that no one on the store's side would have objected. You don't have a PR event where the key advertised celebrity doesn't show up. That's not good press for the team either. True, some device was needed to cause the conflict, but this one was a poor excuse.

Mary Cartwright (Rachel Leigh Cook) a book-store owner struggling financially, and suspended hockey player Adam Clayborn (Niall Matter) needing to clean up his bad boy/hot temper attitude are paired together to achieve their objectives. The story is solid and the supporting cast is entertaining, especially Mary's brother Tyler Cartwright (Niall Matter).While I am a fan of Rachael Leigh Cook and Niall Matter I don't feel that their chemistry was very convincing. I still give it a solid 6 but it isn't anything that I will look forward to seeing again.1/13/2018 --- Victor J.