172 min
7
2011
USA
While still mourning the loss of her husband and daughter, recently widowed Ellie King visits her brother Aaron Davis and his children for Christmas. Ellie does her best to enjoy the holidays, even making new friends with Mrs. Thompson, a local shop keeper, and handsome admirer Deputy Strode. Settling in nicely with her brother's family, Ellie also meets Erik, a young man abandoned by his outlaw father whom Aaron has taken in as one of his own. When Aaron travels out of town to purchase adjacent land for farming, Ellie agrees to watch his children, but the season’s festivities are threatened when Aaron goes missing.
Overview
Reviews
Reno wrote:> 11. The story of Ellie & Aaron Davis: Getting ready for the festival.
The eleventh and the final one in the Hallmark's 'Love Comes Softly' movie series. Inspired by the characters from Jannete Oke's original book. Only the eight titles were the adapted screenplay and remaining two were original, but prequels. So all the ten films had connections, but was not in the chronological order. Prior to this watch, I was wondering where this one would fit in the series. Technically, it is neither a sequel nor a prequel, but my guess is it sets in a parallel timeline to the fifth movie with the characters those derived from the previous films.
Patently, I was eager for this, at a time it was very sad that no more movies after this one in the series. These were the beautiful family drama episodes, obviously had ups and downs, but certainly it maintained the quality and context as it promised. This was a two part movie and each 90 minutes long. It looks natural these days a final movie in the series to split into two equal parts. The silver-screen films are done for the commercial purpose, but I don't know the reason behind this television film. Surely it was not a small story that stretched to nearly a 3 hours long. Quite well developed characters and plot under the original theme to match with a par.
We know Aaron, the little boy from 'Love's Enduring Promise', whose parents were Marty and Clark Davis. Missie is his half sister, but the question remains who's Ellie? Actually Ellie was not introduced so far in the series who was born after Aaron, but the story was proceeded with Missie who got married Willie and moved away. Thus, it had no time to launch Ellie, in fact, she was unnecessary until now. But the thing is the filmmakers failed to make sure the viewers get the proper clarification. These series' so called cliche is, the deaths, that continued here as well. Almost all the films open with a similar fashion, except I think one or two movies.
> "I didn't grow old by making mistakes."
In the first part, it was a bit slow to start, but strongly ended with spilling some suspense to carry going to the next part. I went with so much curiosity, then I ended with a little disappointment. The story was neat in order and clearly explored all the corners, though slightly the theme was overused or maybe jumps off the line. Felt like I was watching some kind of Christmas carol movie. You are religious or not, that does not matter here, because of the praiseworthy subject about human life. To me it was one of the best in the series, except that Christmas miracle thingy which turned it from realistic to a fantasy.
We can learn so many things from these films. Like today we easily contact with our dear ones from the halfway across the world through texts and video calls. But where this story set in the latter half of the 19th century, earning money, the food, getting shelter, long journeys, even it lets us know the struggles in life in the un-advanced medicinal world. I admit like I said I have usually seen plenty of western films that associated with action, adventure, crime, thriller. But it was very occasional to get a pure family enjoyable western drama. I think 'As I Lay Dying' was the last time I saw one which was severely underrated.
Like I mentioned the Love saga ended with the previous film, this one was simply an extra piece attached to the series somewhere in the middle. Especially targeted for the festival season audience to watch with their families who are supposed to be the fans of this original series. I had a wonderful time the last few days with this series. I suppose I said it in all the previous reviews and again saying that it is a feel good movie series, about love, faith, society, struggles, friends, family and many more good and bad stuffs. Overall, it was the fine movies for the families, except a few technical flaws (that is common in the television movies), which are acceptable to the television standards. Finally, the time has come to me to put an end to the Love saga reviews.
7½/10
