When it comes to Christmas movies, most people associate them with the Hallmark Channel.  I can understand this stereotype to a degree.  The famous greeting card company is arguably tailormade for this time of the year.  Over the years, they have responded accordingly, not only in purveying the cards one picks up in the drug store, but producing made-for-television films about December 25^th.  Nonetheless, a case can be made that the Lifetime Network is catching up with Hallmark.  Of course, this Catholic wishes they would all catch up with the true religious spirit of the holiday, and I will continue waging that war on the season.  In the meantime, I bring you today’s entry, Snowed-Inn Christmas (2017).  Get it?

What Jenna Hudson (Bethany Joy Lenz) and Kevin Jenner (Andrew Walker) are getting at the start of Snowed-Inn Christmas is themselves out of bed.  The prompt Jenna is early to rise, making herself a neat and organized breakfast.  In contrast, Kevin sleeps in and stuffs a leftover piece of pizza in his mouth.  They may be opposites, but they are journalists for a fictitious travel magazine called Epiphany.  And there, my friends, is a Catholic reference to be made.  The Christmas season often ends with the Feast of the Epiphany, which celebrates the visit of the Three Wise Men to the infant Jesus.  None of this finds its way into the movie, but a Catholic has to celebrate such things whenever they are found.  As for our two leads, we learn a few more things about them as they prepare to leave for their job.  Jenna has an ex-boyfriend, Andrew (Jefferson Brown), who she had hoped to spend Christmas with, along with his family.  Kevin is perpetually single, but when see him talk to his sister, Meagan Jenner (Stephanie Moroz), we find he has deeper issues.  Meagan is inviting him to come home for Christmas, but he using a potential assignment in Aspen, Colorado, to dodge the question.  She knows the real reason, that he is still hurting from the passing of their father, so she is understanding.  Still, to be ordered to go to Colorado for the holidays has the potential to make his career.  The same can be said for Jenna.  Thus, they are surprised when their editor-in-chief and boss, Simone Jenkins (Tasha Smith), tells them they are both going.  Over their joint protests, she explains that things are difficult for their publication.  Hence, she is sending the pair in order to judge who might be the more valuable to Epiphany.  More privately, Simone admonishes Jenna that this might be a good opportunity for the reporter to forget about Andrew.  Despite Jenna’s reservations about working with the manchild Kevin, she resigns herself to the trip.  Naturally, they are sitting next to each other on the airplane.  This gives him a close-up view of her nervousness as they fly through wintry turbulence.  Unfortunately, that weather grounds them well short of their destination.  Instead of Aspen, Colorado, they land in Santa Claus, Indiana.  By the way, there is actually a city called Santa Claus in Indiana, but no matter what this movie would tell you, Mr. and Mrs. Claus do not live there.  Instead, Jenna and Kevin are randomly greeted by Carole (Belinda Montgomery) and Chris Winters (John B. Lowe).  Because there appears no traveling to Colorado any time soon, the Winters offer to put Jenna and Kevin up in their historic bed and breakfast.  The Winters drive Jenna and Kevin there in their car called “Rudolph.”  I hope you can see what is going on here?  Jenna and Kevin are bemused by these Santa clues, but less amused by the prospect of not being able to complete their expected stories. Yet, when Simone hears of their predicament, she senses an opportunity for something different.  Therefore, she tells her writers to stay in Santa Claus and give her new material.  In speaking to Carole, Jenna is told that the inn, which is supposed to be registered as a national historic landmark, is in danger of being closed because the original deed is missing.  Further, no one believes the Winters’ version of events that the town was founded by St. Nicholas.  Given her orphan upbringing and the building’s overflowing Christmas charm, Jenna decides saving the establishment is going to be her angle.  Kevin has more trouble coming up with ideas, but he typically waits until the last moment to begin an article.  This gives him plenty of time to scoff at Jenna’s pluckiness.  Inevitably, she grows on him, and they end up making cookies together one night when they cannot sleep.  Next, he surprises her by bringing her to meet his family since he happens to also be from Indiana.  On the way back, he tries to admit his growing attraction for her, but she falls asleep.  Instead, as they head back into the inn, he makes a clumsy proposal that they not let their upcoming publications ruin their budding friendship.  Nonetheless, she comes to him the next morning with the preposterous suggestion that Carole and Chris might be Santa and Mrs. Claus.  Jenna had uncovered an old photograph of the Winters, the date on the back saying that it had been taken in 1842.  Mostly, though, she is frustrated that she cannot find the certificate.  Hoping to take her mind off things, Kevin asks that she attend the inn’s Christmas party with him that night.  She agrees, and the Winters provide their formal wear.  As Jenna and Kevin are dancing and getting closer, Andrew arrives.  A stunned Jenna agrees to go away with him to spend Christmas with his family.  Would you not now it, though, that when the dejected Kevin returns to his room, he finds the certificate in the suit jacket?  Between that, and them seeing Santa’s golden streak at midnight convinces them that they are meant to be together.  The article that Kevin pens, crediting Jenna as co-author, also helps.  Thus, she ditches Andrew and turns up at Kevin’s family’s house for Christmas Day.

It is that “golden streak” at midnight on Christmas Day that is among the most interesting features of Snowed-Inn Christmas.  Chris explains it to Jenna and Kevin as something that can only be seen at midnight by those who believe.  I noted this partly because the saint on the day on the Hallow app as of this writing was St. Cecilia, an early Roman martyr. She had been forced to marry a nobleman named Valerian despite wishing to remain a virgin.  When he attempts to consummate their union, she warns that her guardian angel will protect her.  He inquires as to how this Divine being can be seen, and she says that the angel is only visible to the baptized.  This proves true when he undergoes baptism and the angel is revealed.  Between believing in Santa Claus and having God’s messenger appear to me, I will take the latter.  All the same, I bring up this example because it speaks to faith in general, and what it can do for a person.  To believe in God gives a person a new set of eyes, a new heart.  This is a miracle, but since it is this time of the year, you can be more specific in calling it in a Christmas miracle.  This brings me to a line I appreciated in the film.  At one point, it is said that anything is possible this time of year.  We tend to view such sentiments in a commercial or material context.  It is inculcated in us at an early age.  Children wish for whatever it is that is catching their fancy at the moment, and fervently ask for that gift.  Is it any wonder, then, that Jesus tells His followers to have the faith of a child?  The film does not speak to these themes, but there is a whisper of them in that wonder they have when they see that golden streak.  If only they could have the same sentiment for God.

Once more, in Snowed-Inn Christmas we have a sentimental, romantic film set in a commercial version of God’s birth on Earth.  Given that it, like the previous two entries, are made-for-television movies, you will find nothing scandalous in it.  But it is exactly what you are expecting down to the fake snow.