O Anjo Mora ao Lado

The girl Olivia Mead (Izabela Vidovic) is raised by her mother Melinda Davis (Teri Polo) alone. Her best friend is the boy Lucas (Tyler Humphrey), who is the son of Daphney (Tamera Mowry-Housley) and Jeb Conroy (Jaiden Kaine) that work with Melinda in a bakery of their own. Near Christmas, Olivia's class has to present each Christmas wish and Olivia and Lucas believe that the abandoned house next door to Melinda's house grants the wishes provided they throw a rock at it. Soon the owner Dr. Nathan Davis (Kevin Sorbo) wants to stop the children from throwing rocks at his house and the snoopy Olivia discovers that he is the landlord of an old lady that lives in the house. Her further investigation shows that the neighbor is Elsie Waybright (Della Reese), a successful jazz singer that interrupted her career and vanished. When a couple of Olivia's schoolmates fulfill their Christmas wishes, the girl believes that Elsie is an angel and she wishes a husband for her lonely mother. Meanwhile Dr. Davis gets close to Melinda, but Olivia prefers her substitute school teacher for her mother while she gets close to Elsie. What will happen until Christmas Eve?

"Christmas Angel" is a beautiful and heartwarming TV movie, with a pleasant history of family, love, faith, sympathy and other values that are at least neglected or forgotten in the present days. The lack of chemistry between the gorgeous Teri Polo and Kevin Sorbo is impressive. The girl Izabela Vidovic steals the show with her performance. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "O Anjo Mora ao Lado" ("The Angel Lives on the Next Door")

Christmas movies, while not strictly a genre of their own, have certainly become a distinct subset of films. Since the late 20th century, Hallmark and more than one other television channel have run movies set around Christmas for the holidays. And, Hollywood produces an occasional Christmas time film. They can cover the full range of genres - comedy, drama, musical, mystery, tragedy, war and Western. The most prolific are the romantic dramas that often include some light comedy.

The latter are so formulaic that one after another of such films seems a repeat or copy with just slight changes from the previous one. Many of these can seem like daytime soap operas, and after a while the films of this type become mundane and hardly interesting. The challenge for these films, to hold interest of viewers is to provide something new and different enough - still keeping their romance theme.

This TV movie for 2012, "Christmas Angel," fits that bill. There is enough difference in it, that it's almost too complicated a story to tell well in just under 90 minutes. A single mom and a daughter live next door to an old abandoned house with boarded windows. Melinda works as an events coordinator for a bakery, bistro and catering shop owned by her friends, Jeb and Daphney Conroy. The setting is in Louisiana. Daughter Olivia's best friend is the son of the Conroy's, Lucas. One day, he throws a stone at the old house and makes a wish as some sort of superstition that I never heard of.

Soon, Olivia sees blue light shining through a window of the old house at night. She is curious and goes snooping. An old lady lives there - Elsie Waybright, a one-time famous singer, Olivia discovers, who chooses to live in seclusion. Olivia also bumps into Dr. Nathan Davis leaving the house one day. She and her mom learn that he owns the house and had lived there at one time. As they all gradually get to know one another over time, and Olivia and Elsie hatch a sort of Christmas angel plan to answer wishes that people drop by in a box they put at the front gate, the mystery of who this woman is, who Dr. Nathan is, who Olivia's teacher is, and the unusual relationship of all of those people, unravels. And that is the key to this film keeping one's interest up. The romance between Melinda and Nathan is a foregone conclusion and is a small part of the story.

There are some plot holes in this film - there's no accounting for Olivia's father at all. Did he die? There's no mention if Melinda was a widow or divorcee. Or, was Olivia born out of wedlock? In time, one learns that Nathan is divorced and that his wife left him several years earlier because he couldn't have children. He wanted to adopt but she wanted to have her own children, so she left him and was now married and had three children.

There are more surprises about Elsie and a heart-rending moment for her toward the end. Izabela Vidovic is very good as the young Olivia - about 11 or 12 years old. Her persona with her quickness, smarts and frankness reminds one of that young girl, Addie Miles, in what has become a Christmas classic, "The House Without a Christmas Tree" of 1972.

At times, the acting with the two children, Olivia and Lucas, seems a bit forced and overly done. So, it doesn't come across quite real for kids. Maybe the producers were trying to impress on viewers that this was really a Christmas movie about kids.

Well, the story is different and interesting enough, and the cast and acting for the most part are good enough. So, this turns out to be a notch above the average film of this type.

In Louisiana, Melinda (Teri Polo) is a single mother with a VERY precocious daughter, Olivia (Izabela Visovic). At school, Olivia's teacher assigns her students to present an oral report on "my most impossible Christmas wish". Some kids want a million bucks, others a new automobile for the family. For Olivia, it is a romance for her mother, even though the little gal knows her mother likes her single life and beloved LSU football. Meanwhile, someone moves in next door to Melinda, in an old Victorian house, but no one knows who. Also, two possible suitors come to town as well, a new doctor, Nathan (Kevin Sorbo), who often stops for a visit at the mysterious mansion, and a new gym teacher. This is fodder for Olivia, who tries to arrange meetings with the bachelors for her mother and find out what the heck is going on with the neighbors! All too soon, the young girl discovers that an ailing singer (Della Reese) is the woman next door and that Nathan is her physician. The singer also seems "in" on the pursuit of granting impossible Xmas wishes, too, when some of Olivia's classmates requests show up in her mailbox. Could this be an angel in the disguise of former singing sensation? Also, romance doesn't seem to be in the air for Nathan and Melinda after all, when Nathan proves to be the sort that stands folks up. In this sweet little town near the bayou, what else is brewing for the holidays? Here is another wonderful made-for-television film with a sweet and relevant story. The cast is terrific, especially little Visovic, while the setting, costumes, and fine direction offer up a entertaining treat for Christmas time. True fans of family films with romance in the offing will want it year round, too.

Christmas Angel is one of my favorite modern Christmas movies, one I look forward to watching with my family every year. It's charming, heartwarming, and uses one of the main characteristics of Christmas as the plot: giving.

In the story, a little girl and her friend, Izabela Vidovic and Tyler Humphrey, believe an old, abandoned house in their neighborhood has the power to grant wishes. Before long, everyone in school is shouting their wishes outside the house, hoping they'll be granted by the Christmas Angel. In the meantime, Izabela's mom, Teri Polo, meets the owner of the house, Kevin Sorbo, and sparks fly.

In addition to Andrea Gyertson Nasfell's heartwarming script, the wonderful acting makes Christmas Angel soar high above the other slightly corny Christmas movies. It isn't just another flick you'll see on the Hallmark channel-or in this case, a slightly more religious channel-but instead a movie that will remind you of the importance of family and of the old adage that giving is better than receiving. Della Reese, the title character, is extremely likable and will inspire a lump in your throat on more than one occasion. Teri Polo is also very likable, and her delivery of her lines is so incredibly natural, it'll make you think she truly is her character rather than an actress. You can imagine other actresses in her part, and they would have made the character and script cheesy and bland. She adds so much to the film.

As does little Izabela, who, at only eleven years old, has a tremendous presence. I hope the charming, adorable child enjoys an upward surge to her career; she's someone to keep your eye on as the years roll by. She has a great and natural chemistry with all her adult costars, but I don't know if credit is due to her or to the director, Brian Herzingler. Usually, when everyone in the cast gives good performances, I tend to credit the director, who must have helped foster their talent and chemistry. Everyone in Christmas Angel plays very well off each other, from Teri and Kevin's awkwardness to Izabela and Tyler's camaraderie.

Give Christmas Angel a try this holiday season, and unless you have a strong aversion to films with religious overtones, you'll probably really like it. It's so very sweet!

Happened upon this on UP channel. I am a Teri Polo fan so decided to watch. Enjoyed it very much. Highly recommended! Olivia is adorably obnoxious. Very persistent. Della Reese does another fine job of playing a reclusive benefactor to those in need. I'm a huge Hallmark Channel fan and watch most everything they produce. However, so many of their shows have redundant plots. This movie has a real story and can be emotional at times.