A Holiday to Remember

Mrs. Shullivan and I did like this film which we watched on Christmas Day. Having said that it is more about second chance romance for the two stars Connie Seleca and Randy Travis as well as a second chance to find a new family for a little 10 year old runaway boy named Wiliam and his dog.

The film does take place during the Christmas season with a touch of the buh humbug I don't believe in Christmas theme, but as any film which wants to touch our hearts will do, everything falls into place by the end of this romantic family oriented drama.

If you are looking for a touch of romance and second chances then watch this film. If you want a real feel good Christmas themed film then stick to the old reliables like White Christmas (Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye) or It's A Wonderful Life (Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed). I give A Holiday to Remember a decent 6 out of 10 rating. Mrs Shullivan enjoyed it as well.

My Grandfather was in this production. For those interested.. some back story....

Somewhere between 1994/95, a film crew came to my Grandparent's small town of Box Grove - Markham, Ontario, Canada.

Box Grove is a picturesque setting (at least until the sub-divisions came in about 6+ years ago) with big trees, large lush properties, friendly smiles and an old-fashioned sense of community.

My Grandparents have lived in Box Grove for over 50 years. For many years, they attended a 5-minute-walk-away quaint little church simply entitled "Box Grove Church". At this Church my Grandfather faithfully, and with much love and affection for others, entertained the congregation with his organ playing. With his wonderful smile and impeccable dress, the movie production decided to cast him as the organist within the film -- also using the same Church he used to perform in.

It's not without a sense of irony that the film is entitled "A Christmas to Remember", for 2 reasons. First, my grandfather suffers from memory loss and remembers nothing of meeting "Randy," as he called him... and little from anything from day to day now. For me though, when I watch this one movie he was in in the future, it will always remind me of him... his wonderful smile, his kindness to others... certainly a Christmas to remember.

Connie Sellecca plays a PhD.-holding psychiatrist who divorces her philandering husband and moves with her daughter to her family homestead in South Carolina, which has been sitting abandoned, presumably for years. Naturally, she encounters the boy next door (Randy Travis, from the next farm over), whom she left standing at the altar nearly two decades before.

There's nothing particularly wrong with the script or the acting. The faults of this film are in the casting and execution. I like both Travis and Sellecca, but have trouble seeing them as a couple. Indeed, Ms. Sellecca's appearance in this film was a prime reason for watching, but what we have here constitutes a serious flaw in the pairing of romantic leads.

Given that the rest of the cast seems fine for a film that is set in the rural south, one is sad to report that Ms. Sellecca seems to be the one miscast, as throughout the film, she appears from both nature and design to have just stepped off the pages of Vogue. Can you picture a high-tone model or a society chic, dressed in fashions and jewels, functioning comfortably in a dilapidated house in farmland?

And then there are the little things. Once a major flaw appears, one goes on alert looking for others. Start with the farmhouse.

When Sellecca's character and her daughter arrive, the first thing we see on a clear day is water dripping from a leaky roof into a half-full washtub. So who's been in there recently to manage the tub?

Next we have a working wall phone. Who bothers to pay monthly phone bills for an abandoned house? Or maybe she called ahead to have it hooked up…we don't know.

But wait, there's hope. Mr. Travis, whose character is now the local sheriff, mayor, and all-around Mr. Fixit, has been dating a local social worker who wants to marry him. They appear to be well-matched. In the end, will he do the right thing and make her an honest woman, or will he jump the shark to hook back up with his long-lost love? The 90 minutes of suspense killed my rating of this supposed-to-be feel-good film. To me, this was a holiday movie to forget.

The film will appeal to those who understand the struggle of starting over as well as those who remember some drama in their Christmas. I think our heroine was aware that she wasn't running away but ultimately running home instead. Connie Sellecca in that role is believable (and strikingly beautiful) and Randy Travis is believable too, though he starts out timid he is soon redeemed as a strong compassionate male. The orphaned boy is as priceless as can be and, as one reviewer said, he holds the film together. There are a few moments where you will definitely know what's coming next, but it doesn't harm the film overall which evokes a nice sense of heart felt Christmas spirit that will lift you up while drawing you in to the meaning of Christmas. It's a nice film, and worth watching if you enjoy sentimental journeys.

I wish I could respond to other reviewers individually, especially when they have confused the location of where the story takes place. SOUTH Carolina NOT North Carolina is where "A HOLIDAY to Remember" takes place. I emphasize "Holiday," because at least one review erroneously referred to the movie as "A Christmas to Remember."

I also wish that I could tell each reviewer who complains about the formulaic and overtly-sentimental plot of the film that they should avoid all Holiday-themed movies made by Hallmark, Lifetime, Great American Family, and other similar production companies; because this is what they all churn out! Why are these reviewers watching Holiday-themed or Family-friendly Rom-Coms in the first place?

"Accidentally watching" such a film and assuming it will get darker or have an unforeseen twist cannot be the reason why they would watch it. One need only to glance at the marketing pictures (or VHS/DVD tape covers) for these films to spot them easily, and "A Holiday to Remember" is no exception. Pictures for it show:

• Randy Travis and Connie Sellecca head-to-head with a gentle smile on what looks like an ornament on a Christmas tree,
• Connie's character looks to have fallen down and is being helped up by Randy's and they're dangerously close to kissing,
• vignette-style photos in corners show both children in the film very happy in the snow.

These are typical of nearly ALL Hallmark-style films! Attractive couples surrounded by Holiday decor, colorful lights, a greenery & holly berry strewn hearth with a warm fire burning, a snowy mountain range in the background, matching cable-knit sweaters, families in their cozy flannel PJs holding perfectly wrapped gifts; sometimes two people are standing back-to-back as a hint of some sort of tension, but since we know it is a happy movie, we're certain it will be resolved in a positive manner.

So now that my bullet points of geography, ridiculous complaints about obvious plot lines, themes, etc. Is finished, I will agree that it's not a perfect movie. (Is there such a thing?)

One reviewer mentioned that the character Connie plays is much too glamorous and cosmopolitan to be in such a tiny North Carolina town. She just moved back from Los Angeles, so obviously her wardrobe from decades before when she lived in the small town is completely gone and has been replaced with a California set a clothing. Early on, her profession as a therapist in Los Angeles is established, so obviously, she is going to have nice things as is her daughter. However, I do agree that both should have been better armed with what to expect at Grandma's house and what the weather would be like so that they would have better winter clothing and bedding. I always find it a little silly at the way the characters in these movies appear even when they're fixing up an old farmhouse: evening shades of makeup and clothes that could go from cocktails to dinner. The daughter's style of dressing is completely forgettable.

Surprisingly, the daughter adjusts to life in "the sticks" and wants to stay when her mom suggests they will be returning. After all, it was the daughter, who was complaining as they left California that her mother was taking her to a place with "no beach." That particular comment annoyed me greatly because: A.) the mother, who was from North Carolina, did not immediately mention the fact that the state has a rather long coastline, B.) this would have been an opportunity for the writers to "convince" the daughter of how NC has nearly everything California has (including a healthy film industry), C.) if their town of "Mayville" is a stand-in for the actual MAYSVILLE, NC the mother definitely should have told her the beach was half an hour away.

D.) Other areas of NC, such as in the mountains, where I assume this movie is supposed to have taken place, are a few hours to a day's drive from the beach.

The "ocean location" question makes me wonder did they make the daughter stupid on purpose, or did they assume the audience watching is?

The only other thing that bothered me, is that the Southern accents were all over the place. Connie's often sounded Texan. All love and respect to the late Ms. McClanahan, but her Southern accent has not always been the most honed, either. Neither her native Oklahoma tongue nor her invention of her "Golden Girl English-Southern Lady" hybrid doesn't quite translate to the Carolinas. Linguistically, accents aren't exactly uniform anywhere in the South, especially in North Carolina, where there are so many transplants.

In conclusion, this is a very cute movie, and it's everything that you should expect from a Hallmark film and a holiday type of classic plot (in fact, it's pretty much exactly what "Ted Lasso" described to one of the other characters in the show when he had referenced a Hallmark movie in one of his inspirational coach speeches 😄).