The Christmas Shepherd (2014)

My fiancé eats up these contrived Christmas movies every year, and occasionally I have nothing better to do than ruin them for her by picking out all the obvious faults in each one. This one though, this one was special. This is easily one of the most excruciating movies I've ever seen. I mean it was beyond awful. I honestly think I'd have more fun hitting myself in the face with a brick for 2 hours than go through that again. The characters are the most hate-able collection of underdeveloped, badly acted hacks ever assembled on screen at once. I wanted to punch the little girl's boyfriend after about 2 seconds of him being on screen. Mark Green barely manages to move his face due partly to the fact he's wearing more makeup than the entire female cast combined and partly to him having about 3 facial expressions in his repertoire of emotions. Teri Polo's performance is equally as horrendous as she demonstrates her emotional connection to the dog (backed up by an equally as retarded back story) by fake crying against the phone receiver for a few seconds. Even the dog managed to p*ss me off with his "hiding the ipad under the tree" BS that he pulled toward the end, I mean, really? On top of this the entire premise of this movie is completely absurd. A woman's dog runs away during a storm and a little girl and her father just claim it as their own "Buddy's part of our family now" What a self entitled little sh*t this kid is. And the fact that her father just encourages her to blatantly commit theft makes him equally as bad as his daughter. Every scene was an ordeal but the cringe chills accumulated into a tsunami of douchbaggery near the end of the movie. When the three of them go to buy a Christmas tree and buddy picks out the nicest one on the farm (of course he does) and the fake romance starts flowing. God how I wanted a hand grenade to roll into that room as they carried that tree into that house.This is one of those movies where you have to ask why they bothered making it.It STINKS.

I have just spent a rainy afternoon watching a set of Hallmark Xmas movies. Some were good, and some were quite bad. This one was enjoyable. I liked how realistic it was about dating and being older and alone and what a hassle it is to try to 'date". Then the fear a person can feel when they meet someone. It was very respectful to the spouses who were no longer with them. It was a lighthearted, well acted sweet movie. The two lead actors and the kid where all very good. Of course the dog was good too. It kept away from the corniness that many movies like this tend to lapse into. If you want to watch a feel good, slightly romantic sweet movie, that also has a realistic more "quiet" ending, this is a good one.

As a dog owner, I really disliked the premise of this movie. In short, a woman's dog runs away in a storm, and the man who find the dog decides to adopt him as a way to comfort his daughter who is still dealing with the loss of her mother from 2 years ago. After the owner of the dog finally tracks down her dog after about 14 days, the new owners give her grief and decide that they aren't going to give the dog back, and somehow "love" evolves out of this. I truly dislike the selfish father and daughter who feel as though their 2 weeks with a dog trumps the 5 years that this woman had with her dog who clearly misses her. Eventually the girl stops being so selfish, but I truly disliked the entitled attitude that consumed the first half of this movie.

This stunk. First, a soldier brings a dog back from deployment, later veteran soldier dies prematurely from a heart attack after returning stateside; his widow loses the dog in a storm, a guy picks up dog in his truck and carries it an hour away. Dog ends up in shelter, gal who runs shelter's brother gets dog and has it for a whole two weeks. Meanwhile, the widow is trying to track down her dog, finds shelter and gal who runs it gives her a rash of s..t but finally determines she's the dog's rightful owner. So when widow contacts guy who, again has had dog for a full 14 days as compared to five years for widow, thinks maybe . . . no. She travels there, hits the same garbage and that's where I turned this show off. I have no idea how it turned out but up to then, one of the worst Hallmark or Lifetime type deals I've ever watched. Sucked. Major. Sorry if I spoiled the plot line, but frankly I'm doing you guys a huge favor pre-warning you.