My wife rope a doped me. We sat down to watch a Christmas movie. It’s one of those movies that you are certain how they end; it’s just a matter of how cheesy, well made and put together it is at the end. I am all for cheesy movies. However, Christmas cheese is its own variety, it’s one that my wife specializes in and we’ll be watching movies like this for the next month. File under: my wife really loves them so we’ll be watching them too. This month we’ll be watching as many potentially smaltzy Christmas holiday movies so that you don’t have to, unless you want to. However, in the case of Ice Sculpture Christmas, it’s a really good film that flies above most of the Christmas fare you’ll see on television or video.
It’s important to make that distinction. All some movies do is slap “Christmas” on the title and push it out the unsuspecting folks who want some light, fluffy, feel-good holiday cheer. To a degree, all of the films in this category have an element of cheesy, some are acceptable and good movies on their own, while others are shameless and a waste of time.
Ice Sculpture Christmas is in the first camp. However, five minutes into the film my wife pulled the whole, “I have to go work” excuse. For a moment I thought that she’d seen this and just wanted me to suffer through the seasonal cinema for not lowering the toilet seat or something. That lasted just a moment because I could see that she really wanted to see this, but since it was already on and I need to relax I considered myself in for the long (96 minute) haul.
Fans of this genre know all they need to from the DVD box. There’s a chef, a man and woman who probably like each other, have a romantic misunderstanding and then get back together. The chef and the ice sculpture aspect are a bit of a wildcard, but it must factor into the story to some degree.
It starts off with Callie (Rachel Boston) as a young girl meeting David (David Manning) who are the children of the decorator and owner of a posh country club. Right off the bat it clicks off the low hanging light fare drama fruit tree: cute family who can’t afford the club, loving family who wants more and a driven young child who knows what they want. Fast forward to current times and the young girl is a trained chef who has to take a job washing dishes at the same country club, with the same owner-and now handsome heir in training.
In the kitchen we learn that the head chef is the champion of the ice sculpture competition and this year the prize money is $10,000-enough to pay off the debts that Callie has from school. Enter a jealous sous chef, David’s pretty coworker and Callie’s widowed father who is flirting with the head chef and you have all the elements ripe for a melodrama that you might have seen before.
The surprising thing is that Ice Sculpture Christmas is actually really good. Granted, you kind of grade these movies on a curve, don’t you? Well, I do. My wife absolutely loves 90% of them. I tolerate them just to sit beside her, eat some popcorn and maybe get a backrub. For this one, I was on my own and 100% OK with it. The movie was predictable and had no sense of danger or suspense, but it was also really entertaining and fun to watch. I blame my wife. I already told her that she needs to watch it and she will just as soon as she can.
Christmas smaltz level: 7
Predictable: 9
Enjoyment: 9
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