Christmas Angel

Most of the time Christmas movies tend to he a little silly...albeit I still enjoy watching them. This movie was not silly at all! It even got me to tear up a little. I really enjoyed Della Reese's character but I thought all the acting was pretty good compared to most of the "made for TV" productions out there. I highly recommend this movie to anyone who enjoys a good family movie with good values...which is not something I often say because I don't enjoy most of the attempts at it and belonging in the younger generation not something I'm usually looking for. A solid 10 for me and towards the top of any movie I've seen in a while, Christmas or not.

The year is 2015, its X-Mas, and your humble reviewer has been slogging through one horrific made-in-Canada "holiday movie" after another because (explained in my other reviews) the lower-cost Loonie, and the taxpayer-subsidized Canadian film industry, have more or less taken over the entire "holiday" genre. Most films in this class now unabashedly feature terrible scripts, minimal budgets, and the same familiar set of Canadian faces (the so-called "character actors", all five of them) in each production.

Against this backdrop I was positively in heaven to stumble on Christmas Angel. A solid script. Great acting, especially the little scene-stealer Izabela Vidovic. Even Kevin Sorbo gives what might be the best performance of his one-note career. And to see Della Reese in front of the camera again is always a pleasure.

Good direction, engaging, nice twists, keeps you interested until the end.

Would recommend.

Christmas Angel is one of my favorite modern Christmas movies, one I look forward to watching with my family every year. It's charming, heartwarming, and uses one of the main characteristics of Christmas as the plot: giving.

In the story, a little girl and her friend, Izabela Vidovic and Tyler Humphrey, believe an old, abandoned house in their neighborhood has the power to grant wishes. Before long, everyone in school is shouting their wishes outside the house, hoping they'll be granted by the Christmas Angel. In the meantime, Izabela's mom, Teri Polo, meets the owner of the house, Kevin Sorbo, and sparks fly.

In addition to Andrea Gyertson Nasfell's heartwarming script, the wonderful acting makes Christmas Angel soar high above the other slightly corny Christmas movies. It isn't just another flick you'll see on the Hallmark channel-or in this case, a slightly more religious channel-but instead a movie that will remind you of the importance of family and of the old adage that giving is better than receiving. Della Reese, the title character, is extremely likable and will inspire a lump in your throat on more than one occasion. Teri Polo is also very likable, and her delivery of her lines is so incredibly natural, it'll make you think she truly is her character rather than an actress. You can imagine other actresses in her part, and they would have made the character and script cheesy and bland. She adds so much to the film.

As does little Izabela, who, at only eleven years old, has a tremendous presence. I hope the charming, adorable child enjoys an upward surge to her career; she's someone to keep your eye on as the years roll by. She has a great and natural chemistry with all her adult costars, but I don't know if credit is due to her or to the director, Brian Herzingler. Usually, when everyone in the cast gives good performances, I tend to credit the director, who must have helped foster their talent and chemistry. Everyone in Christmas Angel plays very well off each other, from Teri and Kevin's awkwardness to Izabela and Tyler's camaraderie.

Give Christmas Angel a try this holiday season, and unless you have a strong aversion to films with religious overtones, you'll probably really like it. It's so very sweet!

Christmas movies, while not strictly a genre of their own, have certainly become a distinct subset of films. Since the late 20th century, Hallmark and more than one other television channel have run movies set around Christmas for the holidays. And, Hollywood produces an occasional Christmas time film. They can cover the full range of genres - comedy, drama, musical, mystery, tragedy, war and Western. The most prolific are the romantic dramas that often include some light comedy.

The latter are so formulaic that one after another of such films seems a repeat or copy with just slight changes from the previous one. Many of these can seem like daytime soap operas, and after a while the films of this type become mundane and hardly interesting. The challenge for these films, to hold interest of viewers is to provide something new and different enough - still keeping their romance theme.

This TV movie for 2012, "Christmas Angel," fits that bill. There is enough difference in it, that it's almost too complicated a story to tell well in just under 90 minutes. A single mom and a daughter live next door to an old abandoned house with boarded windows. Melinda works as an events coordinator for a bakery, bistro and catering shop owned by her friends, Jeb and Daphney Conroy. The setting is in Louisiana. Daughter Olivia's best friend is the son of the Conroy's, Lucas. One day, he throws a stone at the old house and makes a wish as some sort of superstition that I never heard of.

Soon, Olivia sees blue light shining through a window of the old house at night. She is curious and goes snooping. An old lady lives there - Elsie Waybright, a one-time famous singer, Olivia discovers, who chooses to live in seclusion. Olivia also bumps into Dr. Nathan Davis leaving the house one day. She and her mom learn that he owns the house and had lived there at one time. As they all gradually get to know one another over time, and Olivia and Elsie hatch a sort of Christmas angel plan to answer wishes that people drop by in a box they put at the front gate, the mystery of who this woman is, who Dr. Nathan is, who Olivia's teacher is, and the unusual relationship of all of those people, unravels. And that is the key to this film keeping one's interest up. The romance between Melinda and Nathan is a foregone conclusion and is a small part of the story.

There are some plot holes in this film - there's no accounting for Olivia's father at all. Did he die? There's no mention if Melinda was a widow or divorcee. Or, was Olivia born out of wedlock? In time, one learns that Nathan is divorced and that his wife left him several years earlier because he couldn't have children. He wanted to adopt but she wanted to have her own children, so she left him and was now married and had three children.

There are more surprises about Elsie and a heart-rending moment for her toward the end. Izabela Vidovic is very good as the young Olivia - about 11 or 12 years old. Her persona with her quickness, smarts and frankness reminds one of that young girl, Addie Miles, in what has become a Christmas classic, "The House Without a Christmas Tree" of 1972.

At times, the acting with the two children, Olivia and Lucas, seems a bit forced and overly done. So, it doesn't come across quite real for kids. Maybe the producers were trying to impress on viewers that this was really a Christmas movie about kids.

Well, the story is different and interesting enough, and the cast and acting for the most part are good enough. So, this turns out to be a notch above the average film of this type.

Happened upon this on UP channel. I am a Teri Polo fan so decided to watch. Enjoyed it very much. Highly recommended! Olivia is adorably obnoxious. Very persistent. Della Reese does another fine job of playing a reclusive benefactor to those in need. I'm a huge Hallmark Channel fan and watch most everything they produce. However, so many of their shows have redundant plots. This movie has a real story and can be emotional at times.