A Ring for Christmas

When I saw that the writer of this mess was the female lead, that mystery was compounded. The acting of virtually everyone in this show was really really bad. Angie's former teacher, in a dialogue with her did not even make eye contact with her but was looking over her shoulder to read her lines. I kid you not. Check it out. The school scenes were painful to watch. The writer obviously has never met a real child in her life.

The leads were badly cast. The "hot jock/coach" was not only not hot, he was not even fit looking. The female lead did not look the part of the spoiled rich beauty. I thought she was attractive, but she should have been glammed up and had conventionally pretty features. (Because let's face it, if she was spoiled and rich, work would have been done.) The script did not make sense. Why would a loving mother just "just cut her daughter off" from her allowance. Angie was kind and generous hearted and very intelligent. She had some large bills, but no foundation was laid for such an action. She should have insisted her daughter get a job and become self supporting, yes, but get a job first. And put her on a budget. Put a limit on her credit cards.

The whole thing was very disjointed like it was put together with scotch tape. The characters were not consistent. Their personalities did not match their actions. It had a whole "Hey gang, let's put on a show!" feel.

The writer/actress, Liliana Tandon, has an impressive resume. What happened here? Why would she write herself such a dumb part in such a amaturish movie. How did it get green-lighted? The preview made this look funny and entertaining. I hate-watched the last hour and a half. Very disappointed.

If anything, it's the equivalent of a ring that has patches of beauty but has too many patches of ugliness. That is not being said with no malice, despite not being taken by the premise part of me did want to like this. Most of 2020's Christmas output (whether Hallmark, Lifetime or other) was a very mixed one, with no film that was exceptional but very few were also terrible. Most ranged between mediocre and decent, but there were some that fell into the extremes of good and bad.

'A Ring for Christmas' is one of the 2020 Christmas films that fell into the bad extreme. It has a few good things, though they were more just above moderate good things rather than massive, but they are vastly outweighed by the bad things. And sadly the worst of the bad things are executed absolutely awfully. Other than the production values not being too bad all things considered and a couple of decent performances, 'A Ring for Christmas' was pretty difficult to sit through.

The good things shall be mentioned first. The best thing about it is the performance of Dean Geyer, who is very amiable as the one interesting and rootable character in the entire film. Despite being criminally underused, Michael Gross does make much of little and made me smile.

Production values show some degree of professionalism and don't look cheap. Parts of the music were pleasant.

When it comes to the praise, that is pretty much it. The rest of the acting is awful. On one extreme, we have Kate McGarrigle overacting to an embarrassing degree, this kind of scenery chewing wouldn't pass for guilty pleasure fun but merely annoying. On the other extreme, we have Liliana Tandon completely cold and bland lead performance that has so little emotion or committment. There is no chemistry between the actors, what there was felt made up on the spot, and Gabe is the only character that is worth caring for. Everybody else bored and irritated me and Gross is not in it enough to compensate, despite him being pretty good.

In regard to the central relationship, that was on the practically endangered species side. Tandon and Geyer are so disconnected from each other and the relationship itself in the writing goes nowhere for most of the time until rushing it through in the contrived and too pat final quarter. The script throughout is truly awkward and very stilted in a verbose way. Almost like a hastily written first draft not checked through. The story never grabbed me with a very dull first half, which felt slow, over-stretched and uneventful. When it picks up marginally too late, it's very contrived and the whole film has no warmth or charm, no nothing. The direction is routine at best and is often disorganised and hesitant.

Bottom line, not good at all. 3/10.

This was hard to watch. Not terrible, but the lead actress was not believable. Gabe was the only one that was believable. He looked better than the supposed athletic jock.

Where to begin with this one...well, I did manage to get thru it, which I am proud of, as it was difficult to watch and stay engaged with at times. The storyline is not very good. I do understand it is a made-for-TV movie, so maybe I am being a bit too harsh. That said, the script was also rather weak. I have, over the years, noticed that UPtv and ION often have these original movies where there is this, what I call, 'corky' humor. It does not really work for me. The actors too often overact in such scenes; an example in this one is the performance of Kate McGarrigle as Paulette (Angie's friend). Maybe this is bad acting, or maybe it is what they and the director/writer are after, I do not know, but I find it difficult to watch for the most part. The acting overall in this movie was unimpressive. The lead (and writer of the film), Liliana Tandon (playing Angie), was difficult to watch at times. Do not get me wrong, she had a couple of decent scenes, but overall, her performance was mediocre at best. If it was not for the performance of Dean Geyer as Gabe, this movie would have been too difficult to finish. He had a pretty good performance. The supporting cast was not very impressive either. Another reviewer on here stated, 'Angie's former teacher, in a dialogue with her did not even make eye contact with her but was looking over her shoulder to read her lines.' I read this and immediately laughed because I was thinking something was off with her performance. Now I know why. Funny. They should have given more lines to Michael Gross (the dad), as he too had a good performance. There was a bit of Christmas cheer and a festive atmosphere, especially towards the (e.g., the children at school), which was nice. And the scenery and sets were nice, were festive. Overall, I am sorry to say, this edition to UPtv's 2020 Christmas season was a big disappointment.

The story is a bit unusual, but it is a marriage of convenience story. The lead female is a bit of a spoiled debutante, so mom cuts her off, abruptly. However, Angie discovers she can inherit a trust fund if she marries. There's a problem with the basic assumptions which create some inconsistency. The first scenes intentionally try to show how much of a spoiled spendthrift, Angie is. Then the entire rest of the movie, Angie is intelligent, generous and even at times diligent and industrious. Her attitude wavers back and forth from a little spoiled to a lot generous. Beyond that inconsistency, the story is awkward at times. Conversations. Situations. It's like everyone is trying too hard.

The eventual romantic outcome is obvious almost from the moment Angie returns home. These two have decent chemistry at times. Almost all of the acting is bad. Liliana Tandon is inconsistent - again, it seems like she is trying to hard to make up for lack of experience and natural talent. Paulette, the friend, is too over-the-top greedy. Lorraine Bracco almost slurs her words at times. Dean Geyer is decent, but there's too little of him.

I said the outcome is obvious, but there were a couple of fun bumps getting there.

There's a side story of Angie working with kids at school. There's some sweet moments, but it's too disconnected from the rest of the story. There is a very cute and funny scene with kids helping her practice for an interview.

I would have liked to see this story executed better including resolving some of the clumsiness in the plot. The basic idea has potential and Angie can be an appealing character. There's some definite pluses. There's obvious minuses. Let's put it this way - I could see myself watching this again next year.

Regarding rating and review distributions, something is hinky. Three 10 star reviews are the only one from that reviewer. And for ratings, the quantity of 10 stars outnumbers everything but the median rating. These together imply ballot box stuffing. My advice is ignore the short, nonspecific reviews and give this movie a chance.