Mom for Christmas should be returned
This holiday movie doesn’t exactly follow in the footsteps of “It’s a Wonderful Life.”
St. Petersburg Times
“A Mom for Christmas” has holiday classic aspirations, but slips on more than one snow Make with overdone sentimentality.
There is no sense of fun in this Monday night NBC movie starring Olivia Newton John as a department store mannequin. Her character, Amy, comes to life to be a companion to a motherless girl (played by Juliet Sorcey) for the holidays. Newton John, who has taken a break from her pop singing career since her daughter’s birth in 1986, is a pretty prop as Amy, the statue turned nanny. But she lacks a spontaneous playfulness that would have helped “A Mom for Christmas” out of its doldrums.
Sad: Sorcey plays Jessica Slocum, a whiny 12 year-old, who mopes around the local department store, wishfully looking at moms shopping with their daughters. Jessica’s mom died when she was 3, leaving the child and her dad, Jim (Doug Sheehan), to an empty house of memories.
But with Amy’s arrival, there’s no joy. Jessica continues to sulk, and Jim wallows in s self pity. You would think that what these folks need more s than anything would be a Christmas miracle, but Amy is an angel of annoyance to the Slocums.
Maudlin plot: The scenes in which she serves chicken noodle soup for breakfast and causes the Christmas tree to go up in flames could have been humorous. But instead of showing the Slocums accepting Amy’s charm, the plot continues on its maudlin track.
Somehow they decide they all really do need and like each other, so Jessica’s fairy god-mother like friend, Philomena (Doris Roberts), has to work some extra magic.
But not before there’s one too many blatant tug at-the-heart-strings scenes of Jessica wailing about her latest pubescent problem.
Add this to a scene where a mannequin Santa Claus (who also comes alive) is hit by a car, and “A Mom for Christmas” is a holiday offering that deserves to be returned.
More from the A Mom For Christmas movie.