Movie Review: Love's Christmas Journey (2011)

 

The last of the Love Comes Softly inspired original Hallmark Channel movies aired in 2011. Love's Christmas Journey finds recently widowed Ellie King (Natalie Hall) visiting her widower brother Aaron Davis (Greg Vaughn) and his two children, played by Ryan Wynott and Jada Facer, in the town of Harrington. 

Mayor Wayne (Sean Astin) is hopeful the new railroad will come through town, so with the help of well-respected townsfolk like Mrs. Beatrice Thompson (JoBeth Williams) and Mr. Cunningham (Stephen Bridgewater), along with the mayor's wife, Adrienne (Amanda Foreman), they are putting together a special Christmas celebration. 

However, the Scrooge-like Alex Weaver (Charles Shaughnessy) is more interested in buying up land around town. When the railroad comes through, he will reap the rewards of owning so much property. 

Having heard of a potential buyer for land near his farm, Aaron decides to travel to the land office in Everettsville to purchase it first. Ellie agrees to stay with the children. Aaron's good friend and deputy, Michael (Dylan Bruce), agrees to check in on them from time to time. Sparks fly between the two at their introduction, but Ellie has already lost so much that she might not be ready to love again.

Meanwhile, Erik Johnson (Bobby Campo) was left in town by his no-good daddy years ago. He was taken in by Aaron to help on the farm. But the townsfolk remember his daddy's ways, and Erik can't seem to gain their trust. He's smitten with the mayor's daughter, Suzanna (Annika Noelle), but their sneaking around behind her parents' backs leads to disaster when a fire destroys the inside of the Waynes' barn and the railroad plans are stolen.

When Aaron doesn't arrive home when expected, the family fears the worst. Then a horrible storm blows through town, damaging property and threatening plans for the Christmas celebration. Can the town pull together to create a special Christmas? And will Aaron arrive home in time to spend Christmas with his children? 

Love's Christmas Journey created a storyline around Aaron Davis--Marty and Aaron Claridge's baby boy born in Love Comes Softly. Raised by Marty and Clark, alongside Missie and Arnie Davis, he was absent from the series after Love's Enduring Promise. Ellie is the second child born to Clark and Marty in the books, even though we don't meet her in the previous films. 

With commercial breaks, this movie clocks in at four hours, which is substantially longer than the other movies, and was broken into two parts when it aired. This is understandable because there are so many plots and subplots along the way. 

It's hard to say where this falls in the Love Comes Softly timeline because of the last two movies focusing on Belinda. Aaron is probably in his 30s during Love's Christmas Journey, so maybe this takes place after the last movie.

For me, nothing compares to the acting between Katherine Heigl and Dale Midkiff in Love Comes Softly. Though some of the movies come close, and Love's Christmas Journey is a good movie in terms of content, I miss the strong chemistry between the two people meant to fall in love. Perhaps that's because so much else was happening while Ellie and Michael's and Erik and Suzanna's romances unfolded. Maybe the film was just too ambitious. 

Just like in Love Takes Wing, this seasonal movie also had more of a focus on the harsher realities of a small town in the 1800s. 

SPOILERS AHEAD in white

• Erik's life is threatened by a man in town because his father had stolen everything he owned.
• Ellie's husband and daughter are killed when a tornado hits their barn, which causes her to experience PTSD.
• An armed robber steals from an unsuspecting husband and wife who were traveling; taking all their money and what he could carry, while sending them off in the woods to freeze.
• That same armed robber shoots Aaron on his way back from Everettsville, leaving him for dead.
• Christopher gets lost in the woods searching for his father and almost dies when he eats poisonous berries.

This is actually something I like to see because of its historical accuracy. But I feel like the romance storylines were lost and that certain scenes or subplots dragged on longer than necessary. Remember the scene in Love Comes Softly when a horrible snowstorm blows up unexpectedly and Clark must search for Marty in a whiteout? That scene was succinct. It created the necessary drama, but then Marty was safe and all was well until the next thing that happened. It's almost like they brought Ellie to Harrington too early, so that there were days and days that they had to fill with extraneous content. Despite that, I still enjoyed Love's Christmas Journey. I just fast-forwarded through the slower parts. 

If you're looking for a western Christmas movie, Love's Christmas Journey would be worth checking out. And if you're a fan of the movie series, it's nice to see Aaron Davis again. This movie stays true to the faith, family, and community feel of the series, which is what is attractive to its target market. I simply wished the content was delivered in a tighter, more dramatic way. 

• Aspect Ratio ‏ : ‎ 1.78:1
• Is Discontinued By Manufacturer ‏ : ‎ No
• MPAA rating ‏ : ‎ NR (Not Rated)
• Product Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 0.6 x 5.4 x 7.6 inches; 1.6 Ounces
• Item model number ‏ : ‎ 115571
• Director ‏ : ‎ David S. Cass Sr., David S. Cass, Sr.
• Media Format ‏ : ‎ Multiple Formats, AC-3, NTSC, Dolby, Color, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Run time ‏ : ‎ 2 hours and 51 minutes
• Release date ‏ : ‎ October 30, 2012
• Actors ‏ : ‎ Greg Vaughan, JoBeth Williams, Natalie Hall, Sean Astin, Ernest Borgnine
• Subtitles: ‏ : ‎ English, Spanish
• Producers ‏ : ‎ Lincoln Lageson
• Language ‏ : ‎ English (Dolby Digital 5.1)
• Studio ‏ : ‎ 20th Century Studios
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B009A9EMYM

I watched this movie online. This review contains my honest opinions, which I have not been compensated for in any way.

Books to Film: Love Takes Wing (2009)

 

Love Takes Wing, the seventh book in Janette Oke's Love Comes Softly series, was turned into a television movie in 2009. Like the book of the same title, this storyline focuses on the character of Belinda, who viewers met in the movie, Love's Unending Legacy. However, the timelines between the book and the movie simply don't match up. 

In the book, Belinda is the daughter of Marty and Clark Davis, who trains to be a nurse and ends up heading to Boston with Mrs. Stafford-Smythe to care for her. In the movie series, Belinda, the adopted daughter of Missie and Zach Tyler, meets Mrs. Stafford-Smythe in Anderson Corner and cares for her until she is well enough to return to Boston (Love's Unfolding Dream).

Fans of the book series may have issues with the total liberty that the writers of Love Takes Wing and Love Finds A Home (the eighth in the series) take with the source material, but since timeline and storyline changes happened before, this is bound to present challenges. 

After Drew's death, Dr. Belinda Simpson (now played by Sarah Jones) travels with her friend from medical school, Annie, played by Haylie Duff, to Sikeston, Missouri, to care for the townsfolk when they take sick with a mysterious illness. Ray Russell (Lou Diamond Phillips) blames the orphans and their caretaker, Hattie Clarence (Cloris Leachman), and insists they be run out of town. However, the town's mayor (Patrick Duffy) encourages the Town Council to give Belinda time to cure them. And with the help of Lillian (Annalise Basso), one of the orphans, she just might have a chance.

Lee Owens (Jordan Bridges), the town's blacksmith, is smitten with Belinda from the start. But still hurting from the loss of Drew, and with time running out before the town loses faith in her abilities, he must patiently bide his time. Helping Belinda in whatever way he can, he must have faith that Belinda will one day come around. 

The team that wrote and produced Love Takes Wing used what had been successful in prior movies--faith, family, adoption, death of a spouse--to bring Belinda's story to life. Belinda and Annie arrive in Sikeston, a primitive town, where Belinda has been hired to take over the clinic. Facing the expected discrimination, especially from men, as a female doctor, she finds it hard to find her path. Separated from her family, Belinda corresponds with her mother, Missie Tyler (Erin Cottrell), who appears a few times as she reads letters from and writes letters to her daughter. Viewers saw this in Love's Long Journey, as Clark wrote to his daughter Missie across the miles. 

There are so many things Love Takes Wing and its actors portray well, but here are some of my favorites:

• Belinda's loss of faith and the anguish she feels after not being able to save her own husband
• The fear of the unknown disease threatening the entire town, which leads to irrational behavior
• The developing relationship between Lee and Belinda and Lillian and Belinda
• The point where Belinda realizes she needs God's help

What I truly missed is the rest of the Davis family. That's to be expected as a series moves along. In the book series, fans get a chance to see the Davis family again, but the last time movie fans get to see the family is at the end of Love's Unfolding Dream. Despite that, I felt this was a strong addition to the Love Comes Softly movie series, and Lou Diamond Phillips, who directed this film, kept the right feel to it so this movie was consistent with what viewers had come to expect. 

• MPAA rating ‏ : ‎ Unrated (Not Rated)
• Product Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 0.56 x 5.32 x 7.58 inches; 2.56 Ounces
• Item model number ‏ : ‎ 2258089
• Director ‏ : ‎ Lou Diamond Phillips
• Media Format ‏ : ‎ NTSC, Subtitled, Dolby, Color, AC-3, Widescreen, Multiple Formats
• Run time ‏ : ‎ 1 hour and 28 minutes
• Release date ‏ : ‎ May 5, 2009
• Actors ‏ : ‎ Patrick Duffy, Cloris Leachman, Lou Diamond Phillips, Jordan Bridges, Haylie Duff
• Subtitles: ‏ : ‎ English, Spanish
• Language ‏ : ‎ English (Dolby Surround), French (Dolby Surround), Spanish (Dolby Surround), Unqualified (DTS ES 6.1)
• Studio ‏ : ‎ 20th Century Fox

• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B001TOPYY8
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I own this DVD. This review contains my honest opinions, which I have not been compensated for in any way.

Books to Film: Love's Long Journey (2005)

 

In Love's Long Journey, the third movie directed by Michael Landon Jr. for Hallmark Channel's Love Comes Softly series, Missie (now played by Erin Cottrell) and Willie LaHaye (Logan Bartholomew) have left the wagon train and arrived to take claim to their homestead and start their ranch. Willie hires a few ranch hands, and Missie meets their Native American neighbor Miriam Red Hawk McClain (Irene Bedard). Even though Missie has a chance to teach some of the Native American children, she is desperately homesick, and danger may be lurking around the corner for the LaHayes. 

Though I haven't read Love's Long Journey by Janette Oke, based upon reviews, the movie leaves out the first half of the book, which is the LaHayes' time on the wagon train. Instead, it opens with Missie and Willie departing from the wagon train and stopping in town at the general store and land office before heading out to land that has been deeded to him. The rest of the movie is all about them settling in, getting the ranch going, and the dangers and life changes they face along the way.

While Love Comes Softly remains my favorite movie, Love's Long Journey is a fabulous film with tons of great characters who become part of Missie and Willie's new life. Dale Midkiff reprises his role as Missie's father, Clark Davis. He has two cameos in this film as he corresponds with Missie from across the miles. 

With the luxury of being able to watch one movie after the other in a series, you tend to pick up inconsistencies along the way. Suddenly, Missie, who told Marty in Love Comes Softly that she makes good fried chicken and teased Marty because she couldn't cook, can no longer cook, which comes up a couple of times. It reminded me of a similar inconsistency in Little House on the Prairie, where depending upon the episode, Charles could or could not cook. 

Love's Long Journey is a fine installment of this series. Though you could always watch only one movie, there is so much value in following the Davis family saga from the beginning.

• MPAA rating ‏ : ‎ NR (Not Rated)
• Package Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.1 x 5.42 x 0.58 inches; 2.93 Ounces
• Media Format ‏ : ‎ DVD, Full Screen
• Language ‏ : ‎ Unqualified
• Studio ‏ : ‎ 20TH CENTURY FOX
• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B004FD5I1Y

I own this movie. This review contains my honest opinions, which I have not been compensated for in any way.