With Never Kiss a Man in a Christmas Sweater being a nice but plain showing, I had low expectations for A Timeless Christmas…UNTIL I read the synopsis.

Synopsis:

Charles Whitley travels from 1903 to 2020 where he meets Megan Turner and experiences a 21st Century Christmas. Starring Erin Cahill and Ryan Paevey.

IT’S A TIME TRAVEL MOVIE!

RECAP

We begin in 1903 with the auctioning of a fancy clock. It has just been purchased by our male lead, Charles Whitley. Charles is approached by his rival who congratulates him on his new acquisition and proposes they become business partners. Charles says “nah” and leaves.

Our somewhat arrogant lead arrives home to have an argument with his fiancée, Eliza. She asks him to go to her family’s Christmas party in Manhattan, but Charles isn’t even going to his OWN Christmas party so fat chance. He mentions that he needs to plan for the upcoming year to which Eliza scoffs. He is far too focused on the future, she comments.

The argument is interrupted by Rosie the maid. Eliza ain’t about that hot cocoa and takes her leave.

Later that night, Charles writes in his diary and then hides it under the floorboards. Rosie enters and remarks on his new clock. Unfortunately, it doesn’t actually work. However, the inscription might hold a clue to get the thing running:

Wind once at Christmas moon, true love will find you soon.

Rosie gives Charles a little lecture on how shouldn’t marry someone he doesn’t love, even if they are super hot. Charles waves away her concern saying that since he’s rich and old, he should be married by now. The maid doesn’t buy it and retorts that true love is worth waiting for. She leaves.

Because Charles tinkered with the clock, it freaks out at midnight and causes him to collapse.

Cut to the FUTURE! We finally meet our Hallmark Heroine Megan who is dressed in old-timey clothing and showing a group of tourists around Charles’s house. The place has been converted into a reenactment museum of sorts. She explains that Charles mysteriously vanished one day, presumably to find a flying machine.

However, Charles is actually upstairs, unconscious. He awakens and is befuddled by the look of his study which now has a bunch of signs saying, “Do Not Touch” and “You’re on Camera.” It’s intimidating, to say the least. He storms out of the room and immediately stumbles upon the tour group.

The tour guides/actors try to cover Charles’s understandable meltdown. Once the tourists are shooed away into the gift shop, Megan and the rest of the reenactors try to make sense of the situation. They think Charles is a new actor sent by “the agency” to replace their previous Charles. This doesn’t help our male lead who heads outside in search of a sheriff. Instead, he is met by “cars” and a “flying machine.”

The reenactors are told that this guy isn’t from the agency but still accept this crazy man. Megan is suspicious and calls the sheriff. Meanwhile, Charles marvels at Christmas lights and microwaves. While she waits for the cavalry, she shadows Charles and learns that he is a time traveler. This intrigues Megan but the sheriff arrives before she can learn more. As law enforcement takes Charles away, he tells Megan to look under the floorboards for evidence of his personage.

Megan finds the very obvious fake floorboard that the museum somehow managed to miss. She sees Charles’s diary which fully convinces her of the weird truth. Megan rushes to the sheriff’s office to save Charles from being jailed. She then feeds him for his troubles.

After pizza, Megan and Charles have a heart-to-heart about Christmas and his fiancée. Basically, Charles wasn’t really into either one. They head back to the museum/Charles’s home and he gets to sleep there. It’s his home, but I’m pretty sure whoever runs the museum would be peeved.

The next morning, Charles finds employment at the museum/his house. In THIS economy? This is truly a fairytale. He takes on his first tour and it goes well enough. Hopefully, he gets paid in cash as I doubt he’ll have an active bank account.

After work, Megan takes Charles shopping. He’s not impressed with the jeans for they are for factory workers! Apart from that, he truly is not thrown by anything from the future. They bond over food stand Christmas food. We learn that Megan got the runaround from her last relationship, so she’s single! Thank God for broken hearts. He also learns about the internet so his innocence is shattered.

Upon learning that a Christmas moon is nigh, Charles sets himself to finding the clock. The duo tries to sniff it out, but the museum caretaker says that it’s likely long gone. Our time traveler is bummed. He does research by reading A Kid in King Arthur’s Court. Megan appears to like him and wants him to stay which is weirdly selfish. Dude just wants to go home.

In spite of his wishes to not be in the awful year of 2020, he continues to hang out with Megan doing Christmas things. He even gets cozy with her parents.

Unfortunately, the couple hits another bump in the road. Charles discovers that Eliza married his rival – a fact that Megan knew. However, Megan ain’t taking Charles’s crap and tells him that he straight up disappeared, so what was his fiancée that he didn’t like supposed to do? She lived a full, happy life without him.

While walking, he discovers his rival wasn’t human garbage. He was big into charity work and made the town into a bustling Hallmark town. Charles’s world is crashing down.

The next day, Megan goes to the local university to potentially join the faculty. (There’s been a side story about how her parents want her to be an academic instead of an actor. You’re caught up with that now.) As she sits in the waiting room, she spies the magic clock. She manages to take the priceless piece and gives it to Charles. And as it’s Christmas moon night, he can go home with the help of the clock.

Before making a decision on going back to 1903, he attends the annual Christmas party at the museum/his house that he never goes to in his own time. His future heart is changing.

After a distraction, Megan goes searching for Charles in his study only to find a lonely clock. She is disappointed. However, Charles appears from behind and lets her know he decided to stay. To ensure that the clock isn’t used, he snips its wires. Basically, no one will ever get to find their true love through that clock ever again.

Charles tells her he’s staying because he’s into her which wasn’t the case with Eliza. They kiss. FIN

REVIEW

Now that he’s staying in the future, what are the logistics? Will he get a social security card? Is he considered stateless or something like that? He needs proof of being a person to basically do anything like open a bank account or sign up for Netflix. Megan is gonna have a lot of admin headaches in her future.

This film started off strong because it’s about time travel. It sort of went downhill in terms of interest for me. I needed more scenes where he was shocked by future things. Like the lack of diphtheria. Anyway, everyone was attractive.  

Rating: 3 out of 5 ruined heirloom clocks

STRAY THOUGHTS

• This is one of the few times where we’re introduced to the male lead before the Hallmark Heroine.
• In my mind, this takes place in the same town as the When Calls the Heart. They’ve definitely reused the costumes.
• “Next year? You’re always living for the future, Charles!” I’m always thrilled when these people mention the future as a nod to what’s up ahead. It’s hammy enough for me to eat up.
• Show me a painted portrait and I will always accuse Dorian Gray of being involved.
• This coulda been a Halloween Hallmark. Man disappears and reappears! Spooky.
• Charles is handling time travel remarkably well. He just accepts microwaves.
• Megan did a dissertation on Charles?
• According to Megan’s parents, a Christmas moon is when two full moons happen in the month of December. I don’t think this is real, but the clock sure does.
• Imagine landing in the year of 2020. A mess.
• Catch up with the rest of the reviews HERE.