Fir Crazy

Fir Crazy follows the character of Elise, played by Sarah Lockwood, who, through a series of circumstances, is cornered into a job she has hated all her life - selling Christmas trees in Manhattan for her parents' family business.

Soon Sarah encounters a nemesis -an elderly and unlikeable CEO of the nearby store who sees the sale of Christmas trees as a nuisance and wants to shut Sarah's business down. Also circling the tree lot is Darrin (Eric Johnson), a handsome young man who is apparently attracted to Sarah. Add a few colorful supporting characters and you have the basics for a Hallmark Christmas movie - romantic love and people being transformed by the spirit of Christmas!

And Fir Crazy carries off the Hallmark formula reasonably well. Its dialog is better than most movies of this type. It has spots of good acting, a couple of surprises, is well-paced and fun. I enjoyed watching it. But I never once felt choked up at the feel-good emotional climaxes (and I cry easily!) Maybe because the characters themselves never seemed to be very unhappy during the moments of greatest adversity; and if the characters don't seem to care then why should the audience?

Overall, I found Fir Crazy to be "good but not great." But though it fell short of great, I did think it was fun and a movie I would enjoy seeing again during the holiday season.