Nov 21

Nov 21 'Countdown to Christmas' movie review: 'A Nashville Christmas Carol'

The Charles Dickens holiday classic gets a Music City update in the romance 'A Nashville Christmas Carol' (premiering Nov. 21 as part of the Hallmark Channel's Countdown to Christmas).

In short: Workaholic television producer Vivian (Jessy Schram, 'Country At Heart') is forced to work with Gavin (Wes Brown, 'Christmas at Graceland'), the man who broke her heart, to produce a country music Christmas special - when she's visited by Christmas spirits with warnings about her future.

As far as Christmas Carol adaptations go, it's not exactly obvious why this adaptation needed to exist. Oddly, 'Nashville' actually shares some basic narrative DNA with a surprising movie - the 1988 Bill Murray comedy 'Scrooged.' Both movies follow a workaholic television professional putting together a Christmas special. The key difference is Frank Cross in 'Scrooged' is a pretty solid modernization of Ebenezer Scrooge - whereas ... Vivian ... works long days. 'Nashville' didn't need to make Vivian a carbon copy of Scrooge - but 'Nashville' did need to give Vivian a more fulfilling transformation.

The Ghosts seem intent on shipping Vivian and Gavin - which would be fine honestly, except 'Nashville' also makes a half-hearted effort to try to cast Vivian as a career-obsessed producer. She works 16-hour days and once yelled at some TV crew because some desserts were laying around. 'Nashville' barely makes the minimal effort to show how her work focus impacts her life. And because the script doesn’t give Vivian much of a character arch, her entire trajectory doesn’t have much arch. She has so little character “growth” over the course of the story that it almost begs the question: why tell this story?

my favorite hallmark channel 'countdown to christmas' movies

While the script might be a bit lost, 'Nashville' is an exceptionally well cast Hallmark movie. Wes Brown is great as the earnest music pro making his way through the country music industry while harboring some regrets about how his friendship with Vivian unraveled years ago. Jessy Schram exudes confidence as a dedicated producer in need of some refocusing.

For a story set in Nashville and rooted in country music ... there's not as much country music as one might expect. It's a bit of a waste not to capitalize on country music as possible, especially when centering the story in Music City. As it is, 'Nashville' is only superficially a holiday movie barely infused with country music. The script could have pretty easily been tweaked to fit into any other music genre or even any genre.

Lastly, 'Nashville' features some pretty unconvincing green screen work. It's legit not great. Using visual effects for some sequences - like when Vivian is hanging with the Ghost of Christmas Past - makes sense, because those scenes are pretty high concept. But using green screen ... to have characters to stand in an empty auditorium is just bonkers. And this review would have completely overlooked the excessive use of green screen if the green screen effects were half-way convincing. But the execution is so shoddy that it pulls the viewer out of the movie.

Final verdict: This updated take on Scrooge finds a hard-working producer who, after looking at various parts of her life, ... becomes just a little less intense. It's a lot of work with very little ROI to barely move the needle on the protagonist's life.