At its heart, Christmas Under the Stars is a sweet, feel-good story with a good message. It's not a perfect movie, but it has a lot of heart. The performances were great, especially from Clarke Peters, who played Clem, the wise, old Christmas tree lot owner. The strength of this movie was the relationships between the characters. Our hero Nick steps outside his familiar world of big money and lavish spending to work as a humble Christmas tree lot employee, and learns valuable life lessons from Clem and from single mom Julie and her son Matt. He has not had a mother most of his life and his relationship with his father is superficial. His developing relationships with these folks are the most genuine human interaction that he has had in his life for a long time. Nick learns that giving back to others and helping are more important than money and acquiring a prestigious job.
I'm sad that such a nice story was saddled with some kind of glaringly stupid plot points. The most obvious is how Julie is saddled with medical debt from her father that the insurance has already paid. The evil, heartless corporation is a staple of Hallmark movies, but it has to be believable. Coming up with this scenario where Julie will be charged twice for a bill that's already been paid is just stupid. Equally stupid was Julie's over-the-top reaction to the revelation that Nick had once had the evil corporation as an investment client. She deems this as sufficient cause to brush off an obviously good guy who she likes and who her son likes. This, of course, is the middle-of-the-relationship bump that Hallmark seems to require. More often than not, as in this case, the reason for one person to diss their potential love interest is silly and seems fabricated.
The other thing that I didn't like was that the romance between Nick and Julie seemed kind of flat. The relationships between Nick and Clem and Nick and her son Matt seemed more developed than the relationship between Nick and Julie. I wasn't feeling a lot of chemistry between them, either. I think this movie was trying to say and do a lot of things, and the romance kind of got shoved to the back burner.
Everything was wrapped up at the end in a neat tidy bow. It all seemed a bit too perfect. You had Nick get his dream job, this time with a "good" investment bank. You had Julie's medical debt get purchased from the "evil" bank by the "good" bank, who promised to vacate it. You had a miraculous deal being done by the developers, which allowed Clem to continue operating his Christmas tree lot into perpetuity. You had the strained relationship between Nick and his dad instantly mended, as if by magic. And, of course, you had Nick and Julie getting together, his sin of once working for the evil corporation having been quickly forgiven. Life can have happy endings, but they are seldom this perfect.
So, just enjoy this movie for what it is. A feel-good Christmas movie with some great character relationships, good morals and a bit of romance thrown in. Suspend your disbelief about some of the more out-there plot points and you'll love it.
I'm sad that such a nice story was saddled with some kind of glaringly stupid plot points. The most obvious is how Julie is saddled with medical debt from her father that the insurance has already paid. The evil, heartless corporation is a staple of Hallmark movies, but it has to be believable. Coming up with this scenario where Julie will be charged twice for a bill that's already been paid is just stupid. Equally stupid was Julie's over-the-top reaction to the revelation that Nick had once had the evil corporation as an investment client. She deems this as sufficient cause to brush off an obviously good guy who she likes and who her son likes. This, of course, is the middle-of-the-relationship bump that Hallmark seems to require. More often than not, as in this case, the reason for one person to diss their potential love interest is silly and seems fabricated.
The other thing that I didn't like was that the romance between Nick and Julie seemed kind of flat. The relationships between Nick and Clem and Nick and her son Matt seemed more developed than the relationship between Nick and Julie. I wasn't feeling a lot of chemistry between them, either. I think this movie was trying to say and do a lot of things, and the romance kind of got shoved to the back burner.
Everything was wrapped up at the end in a neat tidy bow. It all seemed a bit too perfect. You had Nick get his dream job, this time with a "good" investment bank. You had Julie's medical debt get purchased from the "evil" bank by the "good" bank, who promised to vacate it. You had a miraculous deal being done by the developers, which allowed Clem to continue operating his Christmas tree lot into perpetuity. You had the strained relationship between Nick and his dad instantly mended, as if by magic. And, of course, you had Nick and Julie getting together, his sin of once working for the evil corporation having been quickly forgiven. Life can have happy endings, but they are seldom this perfect.
So, just enjoy this movie for what it is. A feel-good Christmas movie with some great character relationships, good morals and a bit of romance thrown in. Suspend your disbelief about some of the more out-there plot points and you'll love it.