La promenade de Noël

This movie was so bad. The acting might be the worst I've ever seen.

Every year we are flooded with these ' Christmas ' films, usually made by television channels and this example is my first introduction to them. Maybe I chose the wrong one, and to a certain extent it does have a social cause at the heart of it. How to save a park from nasty people who want to get rid of it. Dogwalker's love it and lonely people love it and under the layers of cliche and endless dog caressing it has its heart in the right place. But sadly the constant smiling, and a cringe worthy romance makes it difficult to endure. The two leads do their best but swamped by Christmas tinsel and an awful musical soundtrack I felt sorry for them and hoped that fate would be kind and give them better roles. Everyone smiles and the utter and rather juvenile simplicity of how people really spend their lives is overwhelmingly trite, and the happiness factor is pumped up to the maximum. The men have to be muscular and third rate Prince Charming's and the women are suitably submissive. This is film as fast food product and like consuming too much sweet things it could induce addiction. Give me the bread and butter of those days outside of Christmas any day.

If you are like me, you almost turned this off when you saw how much of an airhead the spoiled rich girl, Luce, is. For example, she max's out her parents' credit card buying a lavish gift for her boyfriend who then dumps her, apparently because of the gift. "No substance" he says.

Then throw in the premise of saving the community park from a developer. I hate these because it's always some stupid coincidental thing that comes through to save the day.

But I hate to give up easily and this one turns out to surprise me. Luce is a contradictory mess of a spoiled airhead who happens to have some smarts buried in there somewhere. Underneath she is sweet, but most of all she is playful and that comes out in a witty dialogue mostly between Luce and Dean. The story is mostly a vehicle to keep these two together exchanging banter. The dialogue is also quite silly at times, but there are more than a few smiles and laughs. The ending was maybe even more lame than I expected, but really pretty typical for this kind of movie.

Some of the acting is deliberate exaggeration like for instance Patrick Muldoon as the husband.

I don't think I have to mention there are lots of scenes with dogs.

From the title itself you can tell that this will be no classic. It's a Christmas TV movie and expectations should be set at that level.

A rich girl meets a dog walker in the park and finds herself in a battle to save a local park from developers, which makes her re- evaluate her principles.

Like many of it's genre bedfellows it's very predictable and relies on the cast and the characters to make it a success. The cast do a good show with the limited material. Lexi Giovagnoli exudes a certain charm as the spoilt rich kid finally growing up and Jonathan Bennett does a half decent job as the activist. The back up cast are all adequate, with Timeca M. Seretti especially good in a cameo role as one of the dog walkers.

It's nicely filmed and there are a few hit and miss attempts at humour to go with the predictable romance. It's full to the brim with the usual Christmas messages i.e money isn't everything, family and friends mean the world etc. This is no bad thing but maybe they are forced home a bit too clumsily here.

You will pretty much know what's going to happen but as a very easy to watch Christmas movie, you could do a lot worse.

Luce Lockhart wants a ruby necklace for Christmas, but can't afford it. A wealthy obnoxious developer friend offers to get her the necklace in exchange for taking her very large dog walking during the holidays. Luce really doesn't like dogs but she really likes rubies, so she agrees to do it. Along the way, she encounters an attractive dog walker at the dog park. Could romance blossom? Not if the developers (who happen to own the dog Luce is walking) bulldoze the park before it happens! Dog walkers from all over town converge on the park to find a way to take advantage of Luce's connection and stop the developers. Does Luce get the ruby necklace? Is Luz the Christmas miracle that saves the park for the dog walkers? Can dog walking lead to a walk down the aisle?

It's an interesting storyline when the dog shows up at the 23 minute mark until about an hour into it. Before and after that, the movie feels like walking your dog down the same road for the hundredth time to its predictable end. It's not the worst Christmas movie of 2015, but you might find walking your dog more enjoyable than watching it.