Lucky Christmas

I am not usually too picky when it comes to cheesy holiday movies, and it takes a lot for me to not finish any show or movie once I have started watching it. However, I was so annoyed by the stupidity of the characters that I turned it off less than halfway through the movie. A Christmas movie should put you in the holiday spirit. Not this one. Instead of settling in to enjoy a festive movie, I became more and more irritated. The plot was convoluted and predictable. While I have no complaints about the majority of the actors and their performances, I could not stand to look at the leading man's buddy for one more minute. He was repulsive in character and so unappealing in appearance that it was hard to believe anyone would be his friend or go along with anything he wanted to do. I could not stand looking at him for another minute. If ignorance doesn't get under your skin, maybe you will enjoy it, but otherwise, avoid this movie at all costs!

"Lucky Christmas" has an opening that might tempt some to think this won't be a very good film for the holidays. But once it gets past two grown men, Mike and Joe, drinking beer as they toss Joe's family mementos into a barrel fire, the story takes on some new twists and angles with a single mom her young son.

The lucky aspect of this film is a state lottery in Michigan that each week from Thanksgiving to Christmas will pick a winner for one million dollars. The plot develops around that when the singly mom, Holly, has a winning lottery ticket about two weeks before Christmas. But several things happen that keep her from having her ticket to cash in by midnight on Christmas Eve.

These characters will come together, along with a few more, in an unusual and refreshingly different Christmas movie. The three principals in the cast are all very good. Elizabeth Berkley is Holy, Jason Gray-Stanford is Mike, and Michell Kummen plays Holly's son, Max.

This is a good Christmas film about hard work, trust, kindness and family. Most people should enjoy it.

The run up to Christmas is the one time of year I am prepared to watch predictable and cheesy films.

This film is just about as predictable as it gets, you know what is coming from the first minute and you aren't proved wrong. Sometimes however you really do just want to watch something undemanding and this fits the bill.

What makes this an above average TV Movie is the cast. It suddenly clicked halfway through that Elizabeth Berkeley is the 'star' of the infamous 'Showgirls'- but she is OK in this movie. The real star however is Jason Gray-Stanford who I thought excellent in this.

I watched this film with my wife and kids and we all enjoyed it so I recommend it to those who know what to expect.

About ten minutes into this Hallmark Christmas movie, I was thinking that this was going to a variation on Rene Clair's 1931 movie, LE MILLION, in which a poor man in a Paris tenement wins the big lottery -- and loses the ticket. Alas, despite some good acting, particularly from Jason Gray-Stanford, best known for his role as the klutzy police detective in the MONK TV series and good work by Elizabeth Berkley as the chef who could really use the million-dollar lottery ticket, this is a rather straightforward story without much in the way of jokes .... a comedy if not a farce. In addition, the problems that hang over the movie for almost its entire length serve not to make it suspenseful -- will he figure out how to get that ticket back to her without blowing his chances? -- but mildly depressing.

Still, the story is a good one, the actors are very good and if the direction makes me think that the point is the money, rather than the people.... well, maybe it is.

A decent Hallmark Channel Original Movie starring Elizabeth Berkley (Saved By The Bell, Showgirls) and Jason Gray-Stanford (the clutzy detective on Monk.) Both turned in pretty good performances in this quite predictable average romance set at Christmastime. It really has very little do with Christmas, which is sad because that's what a freakin' Christmas movie should be -- Christmasy! But with so many produced for television every year, many of the stories are stale yada yada yada that could almost just as easily take place in August. This is one of those. Not too terrible, though. Surely could be a lot worse but when it comes to their Made-for-TV movies, Hallmark Channel routinely has at least average productions... and if you know their cards, they're dripping with sap.

--A Kat Pirate Screener