Why do we like trashy cinema during the Holidays?

The holidays are Hallmark Channel’s favorite time of year, named after Hallmark Cards Inc., the American company specializing in greeting cards. Launched in 2001, it was followed in 2004 by its twin, Hallmark Movies & Mysteries, reaching its peak in 2014 with the film Christmas Under Wraps, which garnered a whopping 5.8 million viewers. The hallmark (pun intended) of the American network's films is the complete lack of problems for the protagonists (aside from finding love), set in an immaculate, pristine, and sterilized world where everything adheres to the rules of romantic comedy in the most classic, modest, and harmless manner — stories that, from October to December, are infused with a strong dose of Christmas spirit. It’s no exaggeration to say that Hallmark Channel dedicates a full quarter of the year to Santa Claus: in 2024 alone, 32 films were produced, punctuating the channel’s weekly schedule and leaving viewers with a packed advent calendar. Yet, without missing a beat, the audience has answered the call: according to Forbes, during Thanksgiving, about 8.4 million people tuned in to watch the channel’s new releases, bringing the total number of unique viewers for the holiday programming to 27 million. The network has steadily gained viewership since the first Christmas movie aired on October 18, climbing from seventh place among the most popular channels of the day, with an average of 387,000 viewers, to third among all cable networks (behind only Fox News and ESPN).

To uncover the secret behind the success of Hallmark’s Christmas movies, which have now landed on Netflix, you need to dive into the works themselves. The first noticeable aspect when watching a Hallmark film is the total lack of anxiety about the fate of its protagonists. In an era where even cinema teaches us that not all fairy tales end with a happy ending, for Hallmark’s heroines, this is a given. Heroines, indeed, because although the dynamic is romantic, the female universe is the centerpiece of stories that are shot in just fifteen days on a micro-budget of less than a million dollars, with minimal effort on character psychology or motivations. The goal is to meet both the narrative objective (finding love) and the production objective (finishing quickly). Hallmark’s cinematic universe has been criticized repeatedly over the years: why, some online users ask, should an independent woman give in to the allure of love and abandon her dreams? While this critique is valid, the heroines of these rom-coms must follow a proven formula that yields more returns than the initial investment and is so naïve that it’s unlikely to cause harm. One of the reasons Hallmark movies persist is their straightforward offer of a bit of trashy romance, albeit structured and integrated into a television business model.

Like an automatic generator of sentimental stories, what you need for a Hallmark rom-com is, above all, a strong setting, ranging from sled dog races to unlikely military courses, or soft, sanitized versions of The Da Vinci Code. Whether it’s sports or the world of Christmas movies itself, Hallmark productions require their settings to reflect a certain personality. Perhaps this is to compensate for the catalog-like appearance of the wholesale wardrobe worn by its protagonists, even the most famous ones, all lit in a way that flattens and homogenizes their faces, sometimes making them indistinguishable. Another hallmark is the presence of slight antagonism between the soon-to-be lovers, while those around them cheer for their union. Love in Hallmark works spreads like a virus and thrives on sequences where a few misunderstandings add a touch of spice to the plot, ensuring the audience knows exactly how it will end. Even the films' utter predictability contributes to Hallmark’s success: knowing the entire storyline from the beginning allows viewers to multitask, check their phones, or take a nap — an effective way to unwind during the holiday season.

Despite Hallmark Channel’s dominance of the genre, it must contend with titles that aim for direct competition so brazen it could serve as a plotline for one of their own movies. Who are we talking about? None other than some 2024 Netflix titles that seem like Hallmark’s streaming siblings: Our Little Secret, The Merry Gentlemen, and Hot Frosty - A Christmas Magic. Notably, Our Little Secret continues Lindsay Lohan’s career revival, positioning her as a holiday-brand akin to Mariah Carey. The actress now has another Christmas film, 2022’s Falling for Christmas, under her belt, as well as a non-Christmas Hallmark-style rom-com for 2024, Irish Wish - Just One Wish.

Standing out even more in this battle for Santa’s domain is Netflix’s sexy twist, which turns up the heat to melt the snow in the protagonists' hearts. In The Merry Gentlemen, Britt Robertson’s character organizes a male variety show (a semi-striptease) to save the family business — another recurring theme, leading to some Christmas miracle. However, it’s with Hot Frosty - A Christmas Magic that Netflix painstakingly imitates Hallmark productions. They even borrow Hallmark’s heroine, Lacey Chabert, known for Mean Girls, and cheekily reference their star Lohan (“She looks like a girl I went to high school with,” she says, while Falling for Christmas plays on TV). They make her fall in love with a buff snowman turned human — keeping with the “hot” theme — who everyone encourages her to embrace. For good measure, they replicate the same fade-to-black montage sequences, as if still anticipating commercial breaks between scenes.

Once again, viewers of these romantic Christmas films can let their cognitive function drop to 0.01%, taking a break from today’s chaotic dating apps or the layered complexities of relationships in books like those by Sally Rooney. These films convince us that, sometimes, love can be simple. Of course, to enjoy this simplicity, you need to be good-looking, come from a good family, have a job involving cookies, flowers, or cute animals, and own matching sweaters for the family. Oh, and it helps to have wealth like the Hallmark brand owners. But really, how hard could it be?