Who are you people saying this movie had a "great message?!"

shanitajohn

Okay, this movie was never going to be phenomenal. It's a TV "family" movie, meaning the actors are good but the script, dialogue and directing are all designed to make it feel a little canned. Whatever. If you know what you're getting into, it's just fine. My problem is exactly how not-great the message is. In fact, it's terribly flawed.

The "Groundhog's Day" movie model is about growth of the main character. What it kindly asks the viewer to neglect is that for everyone else, this is still just a normal 24-hour day! The just-barely-there character transformation our lead undergoes takes place over the course of-what-weeks? Months? He basically has an eternity to "get it right" and hopefully, during that time, to learn something.

What that means for the rest of the cast is that the new boyfriend-a genuinely good guy, who has been a genuinely good guy from the start-in one day, he gets cruelly replaced. It means that Jill, the ex-wife, who has supposedly had time to move on from their divorce (and who we know has had at least one year to fall in love with someone new) she now appears shallow and downright vapid! In one normal day, she can cast aside a man who, we have no reason to believe otherwise, she would have happily married that very morning.

What?!

So, here's your Christmas takeaway, or, rather, your warning: Good people, beware. A random supernatural event (that you know nothing about) may be just the thing some scumbag needs to outshine the life you lead every day.

score 2/10

shanitajohn 5 December 2018

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw4495486/