I must admit, it took me some time to get into this one, but if you can get past the first 30 minutes or so, it turns out to be a pretty good Christmas movie. Leaving the shortcomings aside, 'Angel Falls Christmas' is a heart-warming story with some noble and decent underlining messages about love and relationships, the work vs. Life balance, and about having confidence and believing in yourself. The story follows Ally (played by Jessica Lowndes), an ER doctor who loves her work but is struggling with findings a balance in her daily life, especially, finding time for her love life. The result is a heartbreaking break-up with Josh (played by David Reale) shortly before Christmas. Consequently, her Christmas is not looking very festive this year until she meets Gabe (played by Chad Michael Murray), an angel posing as a barista who helps Ally through this difficult time and regain the Christmas spirit she once had years ago (before the loss of her parents). And so, our story begins as we watch these two grow closer as they check off all the activities on Ally's Christmas list. As others have already pointed out, the story here is similar to the 2017 Hallmark movie, 'Christmas in Angel Falls'. The concepts are similar, but the outcomes are different. If I had to choose between the two, the Hallmark one is (marginally) better, both in terms of the writing and acting. Anyway, the strength of this story, I felt, is the dialogue between Ally and Gabe, the heart-to-heart scenes they have together. The dialogue here is warm and touching with some decent underlining messages to boot. One of the issues I have with the script is the dual romance storyline for Ally: Gabe and Ally vs. Josh and Ally. The first is unsatisfying. The writers could have done a better job of setting this up via Gabe's character. For example, a backstory would have been nice. I thought the acting, overall, was pretty good. Now I agree, Murray had a 'stiff' performance (as other reviewers point out) for roughly the first 30 minutes of the film. This, I believe, is intentional. I think he is trying to portray an angel not accustomed to human emotions, hence the stiffness in his acting, especially early on in the story. Murray's manner, expressions, and dialogue do begin to change as we watch him fall for Ally (experience emotions) as the story progresses. And this is what I think he is going for in the film. Did it work? Well, it did for me, but as you can see in other reviews, it did not for others. That said, the scenes where he teaches Ally life lessons or is encouraging her are quite lovely to watch on-screen. He does a brilliant job of portraying Gabe's passion and feelings for Ally, portraying a sense of sincerity, a sense of caring for Ally that is convincing. Lowndes is at her best in these moments as well. Indeed, in these scenes, the chemistry between them is great. The scene where Lowndes and he sing/play Noelle is one. Their final scene together is another. Lovely scenes to watch. The supporting cast is strong. Samora Smallwood (as Ally's best friend Dawn), Reale (as Josh), and Jane Luk (as Maureen, the other Angel in this one) all have excellent performances. Finally, the movie has plenty of Christmas spirit and festive cheer from baking cookies and decorating a tree to some gorgeous (Christmassy) decorations and scenery throughout. All in all, 'Angel Falls Christmas' is a pretty good Christmas movie. Not one of the best, nor one of the worse this season. If you can manage to get past the first 30 minutes or so, you're likely to enjoy the rest.
