Journalist Tom Langdon (Dermot Mulroney) used to be a war correspondent, but now he writes fluff pieces for coffee-table magazines. He’s taking the train cross-country from D.C. to L.A. because he’s going to break up with his girlfriend Lelia (Holly Elissa) and doesn’t want to get there too quickly, and because he promised his late father he’d travel by train so that he could write about the journey.
Tom is not the only passenger on the train, and he soon meets several intriguing characters including spinster Agnes (Joan Cusack), widower John Kelly, (John Innes), psychic Misty (Karen Holness), young lovers Julie and Steve, (Kirsten Prout and Anthony Konechny), Hollywood film director Max Powers (Danny Glover) and his script doctor Eleanor Ellie Carter (Kimberly Williams-Paisley) whom, it turns out, was Tom’s former girlfriend of six years, and the real love of his life.
Tom is not the only passenger on the train, and he soon meets several intriguing characters including spinster Agnes (Joan Cusack), widower John Kelly, (John Innes), psychic Misty (Karen Holness), young lovers Julie and Steve, (Kirsten Prout and Anthony Konechny), Hollywood film director Max Powers (Danny Glover) and his script doctor Eleanor Ellie Carter (Kimberly Williams-Paisley) whom, it turns out, was Tom’s former girlfriend of six years, and the real love of his life.
The Christmas Train is a Hallmark Christmas season movie, and the plot is basically a watered-down, G-rated version of Murder on the Orient Express. Nobody is who they seem to be, there’s a thief (rather than a psychopath) on board the train, the objective is not committing murder but bringing two former lovers back together, and the third act involves the train being stranded in the Rocky Mountains between two avalanches.
While production values, especially costumes and set decoration, are good, the over-acting is embarrassing, especially on the part of Joan Cusack and Danny Glover, the script is banal and there is little character development or drama depth. But this is what you get with Hallmark movies, so if you have realistic expectations, you won’t be too disappointed.
SPOILER ALERT: I will say that, by the end of the film, I felt totally manipulated, and had I been Tom Langdon (Dermot Mulroney’s character), I would have looked at Max Powers (Danny Glover’s character) and the people gathered around him and said simply: I don’t care if I ever meet any of you people again, for the rest of my life!
Labels: Christmas, drama, romance
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