Jackie Foster is the assistant district attorney while raising her daughter Gracie alone. When her estranged father Jack turns up in the build up to Christmas it throws everything into chaos.
Jackie has well been surviving and really managing to bring her daughter up in the best possible way. Her choice of boyfriend and possible husband really leaves a lot to be desired though as he really is not a nice person at all. But she just so happens to meet a lovely man through her father, who is pretty much in the same job as he was, as a police officer. I mean from the initial meeting we just knew that Mike was going to play a huge role in the story.
I seem to be quite addicted to watching these type of new Christmas films, which are well let’s face it made for TV movies aren’t they. But I have to say this is probably one of the much better ones I have seen over the past few years. James Brolin is fantastically charming from start to finish and I thought Mena Suvari was very strong with her performance as well. They both worked well off each other and created a believable story.
Giselle Eisenberg was a real scene stealer as well as Gracie, really putting in such a confident performance. Worked great with Brolin and they really did have some brilliant heartwarming scenes. I think that certainly creates such a difference that while the film has a huge focus on family and repairing those old wounds the best relationship turned out to be between Grandfather and Granddaughter which was just lovely to watch. I don’t think we have enough of that type of thing on screen.
Considering I had not heard of this film at all I was very pleased to give it a chance a few days ago, perfect for the day after a Christmas party if I do say so myself. I really would recommend this one from the pick on Netflix UK if you are after a nice feel good Christmasy feel film, as it has plenty of different things going for it.
James Brolin also took to the directors chair for this one as well, I am sure he should be very pleased with the outcome of that as well as the performances within the film. I guess it won’t really get a huge amount of viewers but I certainly think it is better than some of the others I have watched on Netflix in the month of December. This one surprised me and I think that is one of the best things you can say about a film. When you aren’t really sure and it manages to go above what you originally expected.
So we can have hope that this genre or type of Hallmark film can actually be a good easy watch, sometimes that is exactly what you need. Nothing too serious or out their, but a real feel to it and that is certainly a good thing about trying out different and unknown films once in a while.