Christmas Takes Flight

I am sick of All these movies having empty cups in EVERY dri l scene. A woman always carries in 4 huge cups of "liquid" with one hand. Hands a clearly empty Styrofoam cup to the person, and inevitably, the person tilts the cup halfway back for the first sip. Ludicrous.sometimes the camera shows the new drink from an angle showing halfway down its empty. Sick of this!! If you can't believe that, you can't believe anything.

This is awful. The female character's family has some legitimately bad practices at their company they just sold to the male character. We are supposed to side with the female character because he is taking all the joy out of their not very profitable family business. She is annoying and he is a stick in the mud. It's awful. I just wanted them both to disappear from my screen. I couldn't make it past the first 30 minutes and I love these cheesy types of movies. Incredibly formulaic but annoying and dull.

It's so awful I am struggling to get to the minimum word count for this review.

The Christmas decorations are on point though.

We know there will be some kind of Christmas miracle before it's all over, but what we don't know is what or how. Or how many people's lives will benefit from what has happened. I will only say there's plenty to make people happy, eventually.

Not having seen a lot of these Hallmark-type movies in recent years since I don't pay for the channel, I can't say whether this is better or worse than the others.

It's not outstanding. But there are some appealing characters and pleasant experiences in a small town up north.

I didn't remember seeing Katie Lowes' name in the credits and wouldn't have known her, but I do know her from 'Scandal" where she was intelligent and tough. Not the typical pretty and perky romantic comedy star, but good enough. Jenny has a nice personality, intelligence, courage and determination and you want her to succeed in getting what she wants. You want this small town to keep its biggest industry.

Evan Williams is supposedly good-looking but I didn't find that much appealing about him. He's the typical villain in movies like this, with little sense of humor and the attitude that the bottom line is important and people's happiness is not. But he does occasionally smile before the inevitable change in personality, and he shows signs of becoming more like we would want before what we just know will happen. I won't say he becomes easy to like, and he's not great, but he is typical of what would be expected.

Gabriel Jacob-Cross stands out as an enthusiastic kid with a dream of being a pilot.

There are a couple of nice scenes with another child who is scared to fly until Jenny talks to her, and then encourages others who are afraid.

I like Charlie's band, which is surprising. Jazz is not what one would expect in the tavern where they play, but what they do is mostly my kind of music. Later, there is a Christmas song I consider annoying which is also unfamiliar. People who like Christmas movies will probably like it.

Is this family friendly? Like the previous week's movie on CBS, it received a TV-G rating and I couldn't find anything wrong with it. And this movie actually has plenty of kids in a few scenes for kid appeal. Most of the movie is devoted to an event for the children which is threatened in several ways. So kids at least have that.

Put this one on your list, if you don't have too many.

Have been on a roll watching Hallmark/Lifetime etc Christmas films for a few years now. It has been an interesting and worthwhile endeavour, though a very inconsistent one. There was never the mentality of expecting a classic or the film in question to be flawless. Something that was never managed with pretty much all the films seen. There was always the expectation of seeing a film where one can see at least some effort rather than merely cash-in level. The former being obvious in most luckily.

'Christmas Takes Flight' is one of the Christmas films in the former category. 2021 was very hit and miss for Christmas films and for Lifetime, but 'Christmas Takes Flight' is somewhere around high middle in ranking. Can see why some will not like it and it does have issues that stop it from being a classic (never expect a classic with this company), but there was the expectation of it being a pleasant enough watch at least and to me it succeeded at that absolutely.

There were a lot of 2021 Lifetime Christmas films that started off slow and had characters that took time to warm to, and that was the case with 'Christmas Takes Flight'. It does take time to get going, is awkwardly written and the hostile banter is too much and overdone.

Also never really connected with Evan Williams' character and did find Williams bland in the role, so it did make his chemistry with Katie Lowes rather lukewarm (in a romance that was already on the underwritten side) and the too pat ending not easy to buy.

Luckily, Lowes won me over hugely and never stopped being engaging from start to finish. Actually did connect with her character and didn't find her too perfect or exaggerated. She is very well supported by Andrew Airlie, who does father figures beautifully, and cute Gabriel Jacob-Cross.

Production values are pleasing. It's not too drab or garish in photography, the editing didn't seem rushed or disorganised and the scenery has a real charm to it. The dialogue on the whole, when the film got going, has flow and doesn't get too cheesy or too schmaltzy. The story on the whole is light hearted and heart warming, while the direction is assured and unfussy and the music not too much.

Summing up, pleasant film and not too bumpy. 6/10.

Generally a pleasant movie. Of course it had the antagonistic leads and the build up to a crisis but the story was enjoyable enough. It was well served by the actors who were very natural esp the wonderful Katie Lowes.