The Most Colorful Time of the Year is a well-executed event with solid direction, polished delivery, cinematography, and editing but unfortunately is a total strike out. Whoever made this movie knew what they were doing, whoever wrote the script did not. The leads have zero chemistry, cringe lines, and no explanation for their motivations. The story sounded interesting, until it wasn't.
Michelle (an out of place Katrina Bowden) is an optometrist that quickly leaves the zone of appropriate patient/doctor relationship and commits what would be considered felonies in the EU to fix the male lead Ryan's color blindness (a disinterested Christopher Russel). Impatient and aggressive, Michelle is willing to sacrifice legal and ethical boundaries to achieve her objective, all the while Ryan repeated tells her to stop. Note that if the genders of our leads were reversed here Hallmark would never hear the end of it.
The film fails on other points too. In general it is just plain boring to watch a movie that revolves around a guy's eye care. Beyond helping Ryan see in color there is no other reason for Michelle to pursue him like she does, yes he is a stud muffin, but he is such a turd towards her and makes it clear he wants nothing to do with her for so long it really doesn't make sense why she continues to go after him, or why he would EVER want a relationship with her. I mean on top of all the eye stuff, she repeatedly pesters him about not having Christmas decorations in his classroom and bullys him in front of his class into keeping a distracting blinking Christmas tree on his desk. All Michelle has going for her is that she is abnormally attractive for a mom otherwise she is red flag city and Ryan knows it.
Unfortunately for viewers, all it takes to get over these insurmountable issues is Michelle giving Ryan a pair of brand new super advanced glasses that magically allow him to see in full color. When he puts them on he smiles, is considerate, and is very much interested in Michelle. Within five minutes he is smitten with her (his words!). It's like she put a Disney love curse on those glasses because without them he wants nothing to do with her.
As for Ryan, he is so uninteresting and all he wants is to be left alone to be a hermit. It is confusing why people are so fascinated by him - Michelle, his wierdo friend, even the hot girls basketball coach. What do they see in this guy? The conversation between Ryan and his guy friend is so, so odd. Guys don't talk like that - it's like their entire conversation was written by a woman guessing at what she thinks guys say to each other when they hang out. Or maybe it's what women wish guys talked like when they hang out. Who knows.
When Ryan can finally see in color Michelle takes him to a church, I assumed to show him the beautiful stained glass, but nope, she shows him a wimpy Christmas tree and makes him wrap presents...? Other issues I observed: Michelle's daughter has horribly scripted/delivered lines, they all live in very modern apartment buildings but have red barns out past the front balcony, there is time for a lengthy and boring history speech by the mayor, three different cities are used as establishing shots, they have the largest florist shop ever, and the ex-boyfriend has more character than pretty much anyone else.
All in all you can skip this one, I wish I did.
Michelle (an out of place Katrina Bowden) is an optometrist that quickly leaves the zone of appropriate patient/doctor relationship and commits what would be considered felonies in the EU to fix the male lead Ryan's color blindness (a disinterested Christopher Russel). Impatient and aggressive, Michelle is willing to sacrifice legal and ethical boundaries to achieve her objective, all the while Ryan repeated tells her to stop. Note that if the genders of our leads were reversed here Hallmark would never hear the end of it.
The film fails on other points too. In general it is just plain boring to watch a movie that revolves around a guy's eye care. Beyond helping Ryan see in color there is no other reason for Michelle to pursue him like she does, yes he is a stud muffin, but he is such a turd towards her and makes it clear he wants nothing to do with her for so long it really doesn't make sense why she continues to go after him, or why he would EVER want a relationship with her. I mean on top of all the eye stuff, she repeatedly pesters him about not having Christmas decorations in his classroom and bullys him in front of his class into keeping a distracting blinking Christmas tree on his desk. All Michelle has going for her is that she is abnormally attractive for a mom otherwise she is red flag city and Ryan knows it.
Unfortunately for viewers, all it takes to get over these insurmountable issues is Michelle giving Ryan a pair of brand new super advanced glasses that magically allow him to see in full color. When he puts them on he smiles, is considerate, and is very much interested in Michelle. Within five minutes he is smitten with her (his words!). It's like she put a Disney love curse on those glasses because without them he wants nothing to do with her.
As for Ryan, he is so uninteresting and all he wants is to be left alone to be a hermit. It is confusing why people are so fascinated by him - Michelle, his wierdo friend, even the hot girls basketball coach. What do they see in this guy? The conversation between Ryan and his guy friend is so, so odd. Guys don't talk like that - it's like their entire conversation was written by a woman guessing at what she thinks guys say to each other when they hang out. Or maybe it's what women wish guys talked like when they hang out. Who knows.
When Ryan can finally see in color Michelle takes him to a church, I assumed to show him the beautiful stained glass, but nope, she shows him a wimpy Christmas tree and makes him wrap presents...? Other issues I observed: Michelle's daughter has horribly scripted/delivered lines, they all live in very modern apartment buildings but have red barns out past the front balcony, there is time for a lengthy and boring history speech by the mayor, three different cities are used as establishing shots, they have the largest florist shop ever, and the ex-boyfriend has more character than pretty much anyone else.
All in all you can skip this one, I wish I did.