Directed by: Nicholas Humphries
Written by: Shannon Latimer
Starring: Hayley Sales, Marshall Williams, Rhys Cawley, Nik Andrews, Ajay Bharti
Rating: [1/5]
Starting up a new food establishment comes with a fairly dismal success rate in the likelihood of it making more than a few years. Therefore, it makes any word of mouth positive to get attention to what delicious foods are crafted by the new establishment. On the other hand, negative reviews certainly do not help, and one particular review sets off the plot in A Sprinkle of Christmas, which has the potential to have some dumb fun but ends up being such a slog to get through.
Up-and-coming baker, Libby (Hayley Sales) has opened her bakery and hopes to bring many new confectionary delights to her customers. When an ordering and service error transpires while servicing A-list movie star Peter Holloway (Marshall Williams) causes him to anonymously leave a negative review, Libby decides to go on that very platform to defend her small business, leading to an unlikely correspondence between the pair.
While I will have plenty of negative things to say about A Sprinkle of Christmas, I must give credit for it attempting to answer the question of what it would look like if The Shop Around the Corner and You’ve Got Mail was made for the 21st century. A back and forth between two anonymous individuals who begin to strike up a fondness for each other that surprises them when they discover the actual identity of this pen pal. That comment is where the comparisons to those far superior films and this lifeless production end. We all know what we’re getting into with these Christmas films, but even bad ones have something engaging to keep up with, or at least goofy characters to distract us from the weaknesses in plot. This film, unfortunately, has none of that.
A Sprinkle of Christmas makes some decisions within it narrative, with a major one being that there would be a Yelp-like review site that could captivate an entire town because it has this innovative approach of allowing dialogue between reviewers. This may come from a place of ignorance as someone who rarely uses Yelp, but I cannot imagine a site like this having this much sway in how people view an establishment. Peter leaves his review under an anonymous name and in return Libby creates her own anonymous account and replies to his review, which starts this back and forth. This back and forth online apparently captivates everyone as their jabs towards each other soon turns slightly flirtatious, with their correspondence not taking place through private channels but rather a public forum such as a review site. This gets coupled with the pair unknowingly working together as Libby’s catering company under a different name as her new bakery gets contracted to provide the desserts to an event Peter is putting on for his brother. All paths lead to the inevitable of what will happen when these two learn that the person they converse with on this bizarrely popular review site is the person they have a good working relationship with in-person.
Again, under the right guidance and some decent actors there could be some fun found in this film as it has a bit of a silly premise, but it’s simply far too bland. So much of this lands on the actors, with Hayley Sales and Marshall Williams simply having no juice in these roles. The most captivating element about them appears in the correspondence between each other on the site but when they actually have to speak to each other or any other characters in the story, it gets mind-numbingly dull. Much of this does land on Sales, who portrays such a bland lead character for a Christmas romance movie that failed to add any excitement to the story. Almost impressive when you think about it, given that the bad acting in these films at least have this cheesy or over the top element to them, but this is something all together bad.
Completely forgettable, not in a sense of it not having lasting power but rather it not leaving even the slightest of impressions, A Sprinkle of Christmas is truly dreadful. When watching these types of films, we trade in an expectation of quality for something cheesy and connected to the Christmas holiday. This film just has nothing going for it, and does not even give us a ridiculously silly side character to laugh at. A bland and completely uninteresting story led by a disappointing cast, and not something I would recommend even having on in the background.
Films with Josh 
