Hot Frosty
by Russell Hainline
Oh Dear Readers, what can I possibly tell you about Hot Frosty that you don’t already know?
That it has some fish out of water jokes?
That it it takes place in a quirky small town?
That romance wins in the end?
You know all this. Either you like the Netflix versions of Hallmark Christmas movies or you do not. If you do not, then no amount of shirtless Dustin Mulligan will save you.
If you do, then fine, join me on my couch as I work my way through a loaf of Cranberry Walnut Bread and a jar of almond butter. Please join me on my nervous breakdown, but bring your own loaf of bread as I’m very tense and will not be sharing.
Here is the plot of Hot Frosty. In the cute little town of Hope Springs lives Kathy, played by Lacey Chabert. Kathy runs a diner at which she greets all of her customers by name and whips up chocolate chip pancakes off the menu for children on request. Kathy is a widow. Her friend Mel, who runs an up-scale thrift store, gives her a red scarf that is meant to encourage her to get out there more. IDK man, it’s a nice scarf, but Mel gifts it as though this used scarf is made from solid gold. It’s just a scarf, lady, calm down.
I guess Kathy isn’t that impressed either, because she puts it around the neck of a snowman and goes home. The snowman is right across from the store, won’t Mel notice it? Rude, Kathy!
The snowman comes to life in the form of a very ripped Dustin Milligan who some of us know and adore from Schitt’s Creek. He is so extremely ripped that I am kinda worried about his health.
Anyway, he wears nothing but the scarf which trails strategically over his private bits. Is it frozen in place? Did it come with doubled-sided tape?
He breaks the shop window, steals some clothes, adopts the name ‘Jack’ because it’s written on the clothes, and ends up staying with Kathy for plot reasons. Romance commences.
It fascinates me that Hallmark Christmas Movies are such a distinct genre that I keep wanting to describe Hot Frosty as a Hallmark movie even though it is not. It is a Netflix movie, which I assume is why we get to see so very much of Dustin as he runs around town in his scarf and double-sided tape.
I’d say this was a middle-of-the-road entry in the Hallmark-esque Netflix movie pantheon. The production values were not great. The supporting actors were not great. The comedy is not so much broad as belabored. I did not feel a vast amount of chemistry between Kathy and Jack.
Jack is a snowman? Sure, fine.
He doesn’t understand the ways of humans but he can read? Whatever, I’ll roll with it.
But when Jack is supposedly melting to death (relax, that’ll never happen), then which parts of him, exactly, are melting?
There the poor dude sits in a pool of sweat or melted snow or whatever the hell, but his mass appears to be exactly the same. I have questions.
Perhaps it was the overall glaring artificiality that made a few moments of seemingly real emotion all the more moving. Lacey Chabert plays Kathy with a powerful sense of deep sadness, the kind where you are all cried out so you walk around smiling and chatting with people as though nothing is wrong but secretly you are dying inside. It’s a much deeper performance than I expected.
Dustin Milligan is fabulous at physical comedy and got several large laughs from me just by being a goofball. It’s impossible to sustain a cynical mood in the face of his empathy and sweetness. The closing credits include not one but two moments that surprised, delighted, and touched me and that I thought were quite feminist.
Is this a ‘good’ movie?
I’d have to say, even by the standards of the genre, not so much.
But there were a few scenes in which all of a sudden it was very good. Also, whether it was the overall movie, the cranberry walnut bread, the almond butter, or the hypnotic effect of staring at Dustin Milligan’s kind blue eyes for 90 minutes, my nerves did in fact seem much calmer at the end of the run time. Overall, the movie was a C, but then a few scenes were A grade, so I’ll call it a B.
But truthfully, you know what you like! If this is your jam, you’ll love it, and if it isn’t, that’s ok too.
this is awesome
You forgot to mention the part where the two local policemen (played by Brooklyn 99/The Office actors Jo LoTruglio and Craig Robinson) are a bizarre mix of goofy, inept and menacing. And Jack volunteering at a middle school without any ID or background check, and performing a choreographed routine with students and teachers at the Xmas dance in front of Kathy.
I loved all of it. Especially after reading that Lacey Chabert was more or less fired from Hallmark for being “too old” for holiday movies. She’s 42.
Ahh, I WANTED to make myself watch it but I saw the trailer and knew I couldn’t. On that note, if people have recommendations for better than average Christmas movies on Netflix, I’d love it. (with or without romance).
On that note: I thought Our Little Secret had a better beginning and ending than the middle. It did have a few laughs which is why I watched it till the end though I did fast forward bits in the middle. 😛 ok, that doesn’t tell you much but I’d say it was just slightly better than average but not a lot.
Reading Susan’s comment I realize I have much more patience and sympathy with absolutely fantastical elements in my reading (hello Betty Neels’s plots, especially Christmas ones–which reminds me I need to re-read the Vicar’s Daughter!)–not so much in my movie watching.
Hot Frosty was my first official christmas-y movie this year! And yes I’ll agree with you on how some scenes are rated A, while others are B scenes. Overall I gave it a B rating because I’m a sucker for romance and I loved the magical realism elements it carried. Yes, some parts seemed unrealistic like when a strange man just gets to magically work around children with no background check or anything! At least he was harmless lol. Sometimes jack was a bit to ‘snowman’ in the head for me, because some scenes he’d know what things are like food, but then he wouldn’t understand how he needed to wear clothes? It was a bit back and forth with his understanding to the world. Overall a sweet, hallmark-y holiday treat to watch. Also I didn’t know it was possible to be THAT ripped…..
This movie was everything I needed it to be. I love the title the best. Someone was like “okay so the working title is uhhh Hot Frosty because it’s like, what if Frosty the Snowman was hot” and then they just went with it. Slate saw this movie and asked whether women are okay and you know what? We are not okay. It’s been another shitty year to be a woman. We’re all out here looking for a Plan B. Sometimes literally. Hot Frosty for president in 2028.
I need to see this; I feel like I’d get some good chuckles out of it.
Don’t plan to watch this, but I appreciate the review. NPR mentioned this movie and I was picturing a muscular guy running around still made out of snow. Which sounds more interesting, but then I guess the FMC would get hypothermia.
I love when media outlets start asking if people of any group are ok when all they are wanting to do is watch media about a fantasy world where people are kind and loving and supportive to one another. LOL. The thing that is wrong is everything that makes people want to escape into a fantasy of compassion.
Juhi: We enjoyed the Netflix entry of The Merry Gentlemen. Rockette-esque prima is ousted because she’s too old at about 30 and so flees home only to find the family’s bar in financial trouble. The answer to save it: a Full Monty type show with local guys. Does it work? Does our heroine have to make a big decision at the end?
What do you think?
The screenwriter has had a lot of Hallmark movies this year and last. They’ve been really good overall.
Production value and script changes happen when the networks put less money into the movies, and I bet that happened–I haven’t seen it. Hallmark generally has the biggest budget of all of the networks and streamers for MOW.
This is such a great review that I doubt I’ll watch the movie. It can’t possible measure up.
A Christmas movie/show recommendation that is decidedly NOT Hallmark-y is Home for Christmas on Netflix. It’s a Norwegian two-season mini series that wraps up in a bow at the end. Funny, grown-up, romantic with all the Christmas feels. It’s become a rewatch for me three years in a row now!
I enjoyed Love Hard, which has a sort of icky/catfishing premise but ends up being kind of sweet nevertheless. Also enjoyed Single All The Way and Holidate. Do not recommend Meet Me Next Christmas, though; it has a charming female lead but I just could not make it thru a movie that is nothing but a video for the a capella group Pentatonix.
I have zero interest in Christmas movies (other than Die Hard, of course), but I do love me some Dustin Mulligan post-Schitt’s Creek. Thanks for sharing this, since I’ve heard so much about this film and its eye-candy.
(I make a cranberry walnut applesauce quick bread–Is yours muffin-like or a yeast bread?)
I couldn’t get through Hot Frosty. Reason #1: his muscles. Is it just me? When the veins are popping out I get the same icky feeling I do watching needles. I’ve heard Sarah say that the actor has to be dehydrated to look like that, and I just can’t enjoy it. (I don’t totally understand the definition of body horror, just that I should avoid it, but I kind of wonder if vein-muscles count.) Reason #2: he was so child-like at times that it seemed creepy as a romance.
I wanted to like it and agree with most everything Carrie wrote, but I did the thing where you slide the time-indicator across the bottom to see what happens and stop when it seems like a good scene.
I did enjoy Our Little Secret but mostly as a comedy without much romantic chemistry.
Oh, PS, the list I keep in my tub of Christmas lights has these movies rated as 7/10–10/10: The Spirit of Christmas (had moved to Amazon—this is the “hot Christmas ghost” movie); Christmas With You (“great start, cheesy finish”); Falling for Christmas (“no chemistry but otherwise fun”); The Noel Diary (“would be a terrible romance novel but for a Christmas movie it is thumbs up—good kissing”); Best Christmas Ever (“cute, sappy, not a romance”); Family Switch (“pretty good”); Holidate (“funny, romantic”); Single All the Way (“funny, romantic, great side characters”); Alien Christmas (“delightful”); Let It Snow (“my catnip”).
(I have no memory of most of these.)
I actually expected this to be too bad for me to watch, and I wound up loving it. To me it felt like a tongue-in-cheek comedy/light parody of Hallmark Christmas movies. There are a lot of talented folks in the cast – they knew that it was ridiculous and were learning into that, and leaning into the tropes. Lacey Chabert was the quintessential Hallmark FMC, but she had a touch more edge to her and it seemed like her character was in on the fun.
The movie is completely bonkers, in a good way if you like that kind of thing. In the first few minutes I thought, “Wow, this is bad,” but then the joke clicked and I enjoyed it. Agree that Lacey Chabert and Dustin Milligan didn’t have much chemistry but it didn’t really matter.
An older Lifetime holiday movie with a similar theme that I rewatch every year is A Very Nutty Christmas with Melissa Joan Hart and Barry Watson (nutcracker instead of snowman).
A few of my favorite Christmas movies from past Hallmark season are now available on Netflix. I would recommend A Biltmore Christmas, Christmas in Notting Hill, Haul Out the Holly, and Christmas on Cherry Lane.
I’ve also heard good things about That Christmas and I’m planning to watch it tonight.