The Christmas Book

No reserves to write - I like it. For Terence Kelly and Brenda Crichlow. For the book. And, indeed, for young, great, admirable Mila Jones.

For beautiful hommage to family.

For comunity life and for the nice try of Chelsea Hobbs and Giles Paton to convince the audience about the small virtues of a story defined by cliches.

And, not the last, for the products of Jack s bakery.

Indeed, not great, not memorable but a nice film about small things , from single parent to loss of grandmother, workholic and encourage for a collaborator, a wise uncle and a fair portrait of Christmas in comunity.

Sure, nothing original. But just pleasant this story about a book and a little girl.

The answer is no.

This was a very ordinary average same old same old romcom that threw in scenes of various activities but with no cohesion to the story.

The letter from the grandma to her granddaughter who inherited the farm was clearly visible in one scene.

It had the correct town, the correct salutation, the correct final "Love, Grandma".

But the letter was an analysis of the handwriting and font that beared no resemblance to what was supposed to be written.

I think the prop person or whoever wrote it had a fun joke. The fact that this was so obvious and unedited was stunning.

The error in the dialogue spoken by the female lead at her speech threw the whole thing off.

She clearly said it was TWO days before Christmas Eve, when it should have been 10 days. A whole festival had to be planned, and days and days went by, morning and evening.

Towards the end, at the planning meeting, the lead spoke the line that it was two days before Christmas Eve. That was correct.

A sound editor could have dubbed the word TEN in the beginning, so as to make sense to the story.

Gave this a 5.

We spent the final half hour playing games on our phones while the movie played, just so I could cross it off my watched Christmas movie list.

Mila Jones stole the show. She is adorable and such a cutie. Her lines were amazing - more elaborate than most of the adults. She was the highlight of the show.

Unfortunately, the two lead actors (Chelsea Hobbs and Giles Panton) weren't as exciting. They just seemed blah, didn't smile much, no chemistry, no condidence, no excitement.

Latonya Williams is always smiling and perky, and always adds to a movie. She deserves bigger parts.

Another typical storyline - city girl goes back to Her hometown, inherits property and decides to stay - giving up Her job and every thing she's worked towards..

Same old same old. Graphic designer from big city goes home to sell grandma's tree farm. Boss gives her emergency assignment. Ember wants to give town one last Christmas festival. She works with caretaker who has cute kid but will lose home and job with sale. This rest is totally predictable. Like many movies like this the HEA is to good and too impossible to be true.

I wish I could say Chelsea Hobbs and Giles Patton had enough chemistry to make this interesting. Perhaps if there had been something out of the ordinary in the story. There are the usual musings on whether there is more to life than ... The acting is OK. The dialog is fair. Mila Jones as Emily delivers lines far more complicated than I would have expected from her apparent age.