Ed's Review Dot Com

The Hallmark Channel,

Erin Krakow, Pascale Hutton, Jack Wagner, Kavan Smith, Martin Cummins, Carter Ryan Evancic, Aren Buchholz, Eva Bourne, Mary Black, Paul Greene, Loretta Walsh, Daniel Lissing, Lori Loughlin, Hrothgar Mathews, Johannah Newmarch

This Christmas Special (2 hours) is actually the first episode of Season 5 of the Hallmark Channel series When Calls the Heart, about a small coal mining town in western Canada in the 1910’s. The town has hardships, but very good people who are happy to help one another. This year, the town develops a new holiday tradition instead of the town Christmas tree in the square, they have erected a Christmas Wishing Tree where the townspeople can take an ornament and write their deepest wish on the back, and hang it on the tree. If the ornament disappears, that means someone is going to make the wish come true. School Teacher Elizabeth Thatcher (Erin Krakow) has one wish, that her husband, a Royal Canadian Mounted Policeman can return home from the cold north region to be with her for Christmas. The new town Mayor, Abigail Stanton (Lori Loughlin) has a plan to bring the disgraced former mayor who is in prison, home for the holidays where he can stay in jail overnight, but do community service in the daytime in order to pay back the town for what he stole. All in all, as Christmas comes closer, more and more people get into the spirit to reach out and help someone else so that they can all enjoy the holiday.

When Calls the Heart is a wonderful series with a lot of heart and the goodness of the times a century ago when people were close and really depended on each other. Some weeks ago I reviewed another wonderful Christmas film as a part of the When Calls the Heart series. It is called When Calls the Heart Christmas Movie. [Here is the review for this film.] That was a wonderful film as well, but this one is a lot different. This one has no big disaster or problem facing the town, no pending major crisis, but just a need for everyone to pitch in and help out each other. But as a quality Christmas film, this one stands up every bit as good as the original one. It is a truly special series and a wonderful holiday treat. Be sure to find them both if you can.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

Rampart Films, Raven West Films Ltd., Resonance Film & Video,

Dustin Milligan, Amanda Crew, Richard de Klerk, Alexia Fast, Gabrielle Rose, Hrothgar Mathews, Benjamin Ratner, Tom Scholte, Michael Adamthwaite, Manoj Sood

Three drug addicts are incarcerated at a rehab facility where things are not going very well. On a Wednesday, they take off on a day pass, to run their separate errands, but they keep crossing paths and things turn really ugly. That night, the three of them are victims of a shock, and when they wake up in the morning, they find that it’s Wednesday again, and all the same things are happening. Stunned, they try to recreate the date, but the following morning find it again the same day. As they are reliving the same day over and over again, they, at first, go for the fun of it all, and act like the jerks they really are, but as it repeats over and over again, the fun wears off and they have to try to figure out what they really want to learn from the experience.

Once upon a time there were thousands of heartwarming Christmas movies, and then one that came out about an evil Santa who breaks into the sorority house and starts murdering the girls one after another on Christmas Eve. Well, there are a bunch of “Groundhog Day” type movies where the guy or girl lives the same day over and over until they are able to figure out the right way to make it a perfect day, and they can move on. This is the same premise, but turned dark, like the first example. This is a nasty bunch of people. They don’t seem to have any morals at all, and are unblinkingly evil. This is a story of redemption, at least a little bit, but it’s also about how bad these people can get. This is a very graphic horror story of epic proportions. But it’s a decent twist on the “live it over till you figure out the secret” genre. If you can handle the inmates of the insane asylum without going insane yourself, this is a dark movie that will keep you tuned in. Perhaps the crimes didn’t have to be quite so graphic, but for sure you won’t get bored. It always kept me guessing, and the ending was worth the wait. This is a twisted little film!

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog