Angels and Ornaments

This is a Hallmark movie, so the ending is predictable, but it features an excellent performance by Sergio Di Zio who plays an angel tasked with bringing two people together. That alone makes this worth watching once.

Corrine is a musician who works in a music store; her boss Dave is an old friend of hers, and is sweet on her but would never show it because she has never seen him as boyfriend material. However, Christmas is coming up and she is fresh off a break-up with Tim, who keeps calling her hoping for a second chance. We know a bit about Corrine's background: her grandfather, overseas during WWII, sent her grandmother songs instead of traditional letters. The last one she got was on a Christmas Eve before he was reported killed, and when she died, she gave the song to Corrine as a keepsake, which she treasures. Her favorite ornament, also from her grandmother, is of a group of carolers, and one night, when some carolers come to her door, she notices that the front-and-center singer, Harold, is wearing the same snowflake scarf that one of the ornament carolers is wearing. Wouldn't you know that, a couple days later, Harold winds up as a seasonal worker at the music store. This is when the movie takes a "Wonderful Life" twist: Harold is actually an angel who has been assigned to get Corrine and Dave together. If he succeeds, he'll win his wings. But Harold has his hands full since Dave is a little gun-shy because of his own failed romances, and just as it looks like Corrine is starting to see Dave in a romantic light, that rat bastard Tim comes back in the picture. Can Harold get everything straight before midnight on Christmas Eve?

I give this Hallmark holiday movie a few extra points for its somewhat original plot. Yes, it's stolen from It's a Wonderful Life but it does have a couple of nice variations, and in its plot point involving an old song written by a dead loved one, even borrows a bit from the climax of The Bishop's Wife. The mostly Canadian cast, none of whom I remember seeing before, is fine. I like that Dave (Graham Abbey) is a little rougher-looking than the usual shiny bland romantic leads, and Sergio Di Zio, as the angel, gives an almost eccentric performance that ends up working well. I had some problems with plot loopholes that I can't discuss here, but I recommend this as something just a little different from the Hallmark Christmas Factory.

Sergio Di Zio wonderfully underplays his role as Harold, the Christmas angel that has a no nonsense approach to true love. I am coming at this from a different perspective than most people who will watch this film because I have lost love to death, knowing that I will never again be with my wife during this life. Casual couples who take one another for granted may be caught up in in the same predicament as Corrine and Dave in the film if they refuse to put themselves out for love. At the center of the simple storyline is that Corrine's grandfather had to go off to war and never came back. He loved fully, but his relationship was cut short through no fault of his own. In what I think is the pivotal scene when angel Harold unbelievably asks Dave, "You're not willing to fight for her?" we see the pathos of true love and his all-consuming disappointment in casual love. I certainly felt it. I was with Harold all the way. Don't take love for granted, it's embedded in human beings and human beings are fragile creatures.

This was a real "10" for a Christmastime movie. They may all arrive at the same predictable place in the end, but the journeys vary. This was a sweet journey. The plot was a bit intriguing and the casting was very well done, in my opinion. Of course, it may have gotten a little "soupy" in the end, but it's a Christmastime movie and I loved it. Probably my favorite for this season. I always make sure to check out every new Hallmark Christmas movie or Lifetime or where ever I find them. 2014's were, overall, pretty darn good. If you like the them, be sure to see this one. I actually watched it twice! Good story too! Christmas Under Wraps was good too.

This Christmas TV movie does not stink (most do, some really badly). It was a story that I'd never seen before, and the characters had a believability despite the fact that this was a fantasy. Of the characters' performances, Harold, the angel was great, showing really good intensity and real feeling (not your typical angelic performance). In a nice twist he, as an angel, wasn't some know-it-all. Dave, the store owner, was game, sincere, and believable -- but not a total standout performance -- I suspect that he was constrained by some of the dialog. However Corrine was the most typical Hallmark heroine -- ie., a weak characterization. As other folks indicated, stating this was based in New York was silly -- a two-story store and a front-door of Corrine's home with a large-ish front yard and tiny stoop are so not NYC. Maybe the authors were too constrained by story length to make it Providence RI, Buffalo NY, Harrisburg PA -- so they said New York to mean some generic big city with cold winters. I also hated the "one-year-later" scene. This seems like a prerequisite for these Hallmark Christmas movies. Haven't they ever heard of "and they lived happily ever after"?