Director: Harley Wallen
Writer: Nancy Oeswein (Screenplay)
Starring: Corbin Bernsen, Dennis Daskins, Calhoun Koenig, Bryce Xaiver, Harley Wallen, Aphrodite Nikolovski
Plot: The unique Bennett-Song family learns the true meaning of the holidays as they solve a community crisis and adapt to big changes. Everything you want in a holiday film: love, the power of belief, laughter, tears, and new music classics.
Runtime: 1 Hour 57 Minutes
There may be spoilers in the rest of the review
Story: A Bennett Song Holiday starts one year after the events of the first Bennett Song movie, Pearl (Koenig) has been seeing her band rise to fame at college, where she does work to help the local community with music lesson, back home Susan (Nikolovski) and Cole (Wallen) are expecting their first child together, with the family facing a new battle against Aiden Neville (Bernsen) that wants to take the community learning center away from them.
The family comes together to show the meaning of Christmas to try and raise the money to save the community school from closure, showing however big the family is, they each will have a talent which will help the family give back to the community.
Thoughts on A Bennett Song Holiday
Characters – Pearl has seen her band gain attention in the year, one which has seen her get the attention of sensation Logan French. Pearl is still helping in the local community school for less fortunate children, with her needing to run a campaign to try and save it. Cole and Susan are the parents who are now expecting their first child together to add to their massive family already. Aiden Neville is the man that wants to takes the community school away from the children for his own profit, he will do any tricks to make sure he achieves this. We might not see as many of the children this time around, but with what little we do see, they show us what they can bring to the family dynamic. This does also suffer from the fact we have too many characters, so certain moments don’t get the time they deserve to give the full effect.
Performances – The performances in the film are strong throughout, with such a large cast, we get to see such a diverse cast, from different backgrounds, we see different disabilities represented here too, it gives us a community feeling with the cast’s joint performances.
Story – The story here continues the adventures of the Bennett Song family, we see how an upcoming Christmas will see them needing to come together for the community to show their ability to work as a unit to help people around them. This is a feel-good story, that will mix the different holiday traditions to try and show that people need community over greed. The story might struggling with the pure number of arcs going on, with some not getting as much attention as others, but deep down it is all about the family dynamic.
Comedy – The comedy in the film comes from the different situations the characters might find themselves in through the film, it is more light hearted style, rather than playing for laughs.
Settings – The film uses the settings to show us the home setting, the community school they are trying to save and how together it will be important to everyone involved.
Scene of the Movie – The Christmas letter.
That Moment That Annoyed Me – We don’t get enough of the family, which were the charming part of the first film.
Final Thoughts – This is a charming family film that continues to get the positive message of community and diversity across in a way that shows us that the world works better, when people work together.
DVD/VOD Release Date:11/10/20
