JudyReyes – Credits Rolling

It’s the most wonderful time of the year because Lindsay Lohan is back on our screens starring in another Christmas film. This time around she stars as Avery, a career driven woman who is spending the holidays with her boyfriend Cam (Jon Rudnitsky) and his family. What she doesn’t know is that her ex from ten years ago Logan (Ian Harding) is now dating Cassie (Katie Baker) who just so happens to be Cam’s sister and he’ll be joining in for the festivities. Instead of coming forward about their past relationship, they decide to keep it a secret.

Out of the slew of festive films that Netflix have released this year, this one has been my favorite. Lohan is in top form here; she’s so effortless in the romcom genre and she always delivers when it comes to comedy. I thought that Harding was a good choice for the role of Logan. The chemistry between the two of them was cute. I’ve always liked the friends to lovers trope and while they were mostly exes during the film, we got to see their relationship develop in a more mature way.

Among the rest of the cast were some familiar names like Tim Meadows and Judy Reyes who portray Stan and Margaret, family friends, respectively. The big scene stealer, however, was Kristin Chenoweth as Erica, Cam and Cassie’s mother. She was such a bitch, but that just made me love her more. You could tell that she was having the time of her life.

I found the film to be genuinely funny. The scene in the church and the one with the family dog particularly had me in stitches. They were just so over the top! But what I appreciated was the balance with Avery dealing with her mother’s sudden loss from a few years ago. It was something I could relate to and it added a deeper layer to the story.

Overall Our Little Secret was a cute little Christmas romcom. With a great cast, hilarious hijinks and a heartwarming love story, this is one that I will definitely revisit in the future.

Rating: ♥️♥️♥️

Turtles All The Way Down by John Green was first introduced to the world in October of 2017. Now, the beloved book has been adapted for the screen. Aza Holmes (Isabela Merced) is trying to live her life as normally as she can which isn’t easy due to her obsessive compulsive disorder. When she reconnects with her old crush Davis (Felix Mallard), she is swept up in the mystery of where his business tycoon father disappeared to.

Like many others, I devoured Green’s novel when it first came out. It’s been some time so I cannot confirm or deny as to how close they stuck to the original material. But I am happy that this one finally got the same treatment that many of his other pieces of work have received.

Merced completely brings Aza to life. The way in which she depicted her difficulties was nothing like I had seen before and I mean that in a good way. We saw the good, the bad and everything in between and I found that to be really refreshing. I truly believe that people who deal with the same disorder felt seen while watching this.

The rest of the cast were perfectly chosen for their roles. I absolutely loved Daisy (Cree), Aza’s best friend. They were there for each other through it all and she brought some much needed comedy to the film. It was nice seeing Mallard in something outside of his usual stint on Netflix’s Ginny and Georgia and Judy Reyes was a spot on choice for Aza’s mom Gina. I also appreciated the inclusion of J. Smith-Cameron as Professor Abbott and Poorna Jagannathan as Aza’s therapist Dr. Singh.

While Turtles All The Way Down did seem to target more of a teenage audience, I am still glad that I watched it. It’s not often we see OCD depicted in this way on screen, so I have to commend the choices that were taken to make it happen.

Rating: ♥️♥️♥️