All Is Merry & Bright

Unrated • Theaters

You’re a professional cookie chef with an order to fill for the governor’s Christmas ball. Your darling children, seeing how busy you already are this holiday season, bake three dozen Christmas cookies while you’re out of the house. You taste their yuletide ovenfare and—sigh—know with each bite that you can’t recommend your kids’ concoction for public consumption. Your company’s reputation is at stake, after all. Still, you appreciate the thought behind your children’s effort.

This is a scene from All Is Merry & Bright and also a metaphor for the entire film. Despite a relatable lead character and a positive Christian message, a hefty serving of faith-film tropes makes for viewing that’s hard to swallow.

Jessica (Emily Rose) suffers from rheumatoid arthritis that resulted from a childhood car accident her older sister Elisha (Shari Rigby) was responsible for. But Jessica doesn’t let her pain or cane slow her down. With the support of her loving husband Paul (Eric Close), she’s raising three active kids and running her locally popular cookie business out of their home. When Jessica’s parents and Elisha’s family all descend on her house for an extended holiday stay, Jessica’s stubborn self-reliance sends her stress level skyrocketing. What will it take for her to learn it’s okay to accept help from others?

“Always being a hero is a hard act to keep up,” Elisha chides Jessica. “Give others a chance to be a hero.”

That’s an important lesson. The film also touches on forgiveness and accepting God’s providence amid trials, but director Cory Edwards gets carried away depicting a Christian household as perpetually merry and bright: The male members of the extended family, decked out in budget Christmas garb, dance around a thrift store. Sunglassed kids sing and bang on their musical instruments, Jessica’s mother (Sally Struthers) and father croon together at the piano, and on and on. It’s nonstop Ned Flanders.

Cinema needs more portrayals of strong marriages like Jessica and Paul’s but not the film’s three (almost inaudible) misuses of God’s name and (few) sensual close-ups. Overall, the heaped-on wholesomeness flattens the humor, distracts from the message, and tests viewers’ patience. If your family is lining up a Christmas film to watch together this holiday season, there are better ones to partake of.