Holiday in Handcuffs (2007)

Powerful

I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Formulaic as it is, this holiday movie has some charm. It is a bit refreshing to have a dysfunctional family inhabited by more dysfunctional people. What keeps me interested is the inexplicable charm. Melissa Joan Hart gives a portrait of a young woman who is trying so hard to please her parents that she becomes a total hapless and helpless mess. One can't help but be sympathetic to this immature, pixieish wreck with moments of regret mixed with a bit of grandeur of a "boyfriend" with whom the family falls in love. To me all these faults are actually make it enjoyable to watch. Happy and handcuff-less holidays!

If you're like me and of a certain age, you might remember growing up with Melissa Joan Hart's kooky, wired, somewhat off the wall, softly spoken and rather trivial TV shows on a weekday afternoon or weekend morning, or whenever they were. The boys and girls of us whom watched the shows a decade plus ago have grown up; filled out; expanded in mind and I'm sure, gone on to different things since. Catching up with Holiday in Handcuffs; a 2007, American, made for television piece; carries an odd sense of nostalgia despite being only a few years old at the time of writing; this is principally because Melissa Joan Hart who, certainly as a screen talent, appears to have stuck to where she was all those years ago. Seeing her play out the pretty-but-dorky; meaning well but not quite nailing it caricature, who struggles along in life and with her family members, might cause some of the audience to flashback as they sat cross legged on the floor, in front of their parents' old TV set on a Sunday morning before anyone else had got up, or indeed, a weekday afternoon straight after school, as they watched Hart do her thing. It's just that this time, there are a few adult gags sprinkled on top as well as a severely dumbed down supporting cast.Hart's character is Gertrude Chandler referred to sometimes as 'Trudie', a sassy, upbeat, kooky-kooky girl, who's left her rural roots behind and is now living in New York City. She's better off than she thinks she is, with a boyfriend; a reasonably good looking apartment that would look even nicer if she bothered to tidy it up every now and again as well as a pretty decent job (although she hates it, obviously) as a waitress at a neat little restaurant in which she is friends with a number of the employees and the manager comes across as a reasonably fun kinda guy – the horror. Then, hark, a job opportunity comes along in the form of an interview with a guy her father knows. But, to the absolute, agonising horror of-it-all, things drastically fall apart in a manner we know is pretty serious because the rapid and distorted manner of the voice-overs. The disasters that strike come in the form of the boyfriend leaving, which Trudy doesn't seem all that upset about to be brutally honest, and the job interview is missed – the employer cruelly bringing down a shutter over a glass door, and a curtain over her chances, as Trudy looks on in agony. Explaining to them that she'd been somewhat involved in a traffic accident along the way to the interview might've helped in at least getting them to give her a chance. But that would be the normal thing to have happen, and in a high-concept comedy like Holiday in Handcuffs, people do; think and say rather daft and unrealistic things at every turn. The Christmas period is well into its full swing, and a meeting with her mother and father at their quaint, rural wood cabin is coming up – only she's promised to bring home a boyfriend with her so they can meet. If you've kept up so far, that isn't happening because of the aforementioned dumping but, Trudy has a trick up her sleeve and some binds up the other: she swipes Mario López's David Martin from the café in which she works, and it's off to the country they go as all Freudian Hell breaks loose.If you cannot see the eventual arc the film will take from both the above premise and about forty minutes in, then you aren't trying. The film is schmaltzy, annoyingly unfunny and misguided-to-the-max; focusing on a kidnap scenario in which an innocent is snatched by a supposed madwoman and dragged off to the middle of rural nowhere in which her additionally zany, kooky and quite mad relatives gather. There are scenes at the house in which David tries to escape that are quite terrifying looking at things from his predicament, as chase around a kitchen and the rush to call someone on a cellular phone from the supposedly safe confines of a bathroom play out. On one occasion, he gets outside but is greeted by the freezing, snowy wilderness and Hart's character dominantly declaring in the doorway that "no one is coming to help" and that "there's nothing but snow and ice in all directions". Creepy, but done so through a bizarre filter of the kidnap fantasy as perpetrated by that actress we all know from those shows years back.Along the way, we get leery and jokey references to sado-masochism by elderly hicks whom work in isolated petrol stations that sell fluffy handcuffs and play daft banjo music over their tannoys. I guess the aim is to evoke the memory of Deliverance and/or anal rape what with the 'held against one's will' premise we've got going on; but doing so in a manner that wants to you laugh. This as characters, such as the father, have it all laid out in front of them but are running on the high concept and thus, don't believe any of it. Holiday in Handcuffs is a kidnap fantasy as instigated by that girl on TV you might've grown up watching; a bizarre mixture of parents treating their daughters like a ten year old girl and questioning their sexuality through lack of exposure to men with fluffy; snowy; sugary crap that'll eventually say: "What you might have always wanted could be right in-front of you but not in a form that's initially obvious". It is nonsense, of course; a soulless, summer-shot pile of dreck that has an agonising Oreo Biscuits product placement inclusion despite, I'm sure, airing on ABC with advertisements anyway. The sad fact is, a film all about Maria the Maid would have been ten times more interesting.

I guess I shouldn't have voted because I only saw bits and pieces, but I saw the previous review and wanted to concur. I cannot believe this was an ABC FAMILY Movie and now repeats during morning time slots. I'm going to write to those jerks at ABC. My ten year old daughter was watching it one Sunday morning while I was on the computer and every couple of minutes there was something. "Slut." "Sleeping with someone" "Virgin." I kept turning around in my chair in awe.It prompted me to look it up on IMDb and lo and behold the first review said it all.This is garbage. First off, it's not for kid's under thirteen unless you want to have to feel uncomfortable watching it and wondering what is going through their mind. Secondly, Mario Lopez is a reject. Why do you think he was on Dancing with the Stars. Keep it away from the kids. Watch "It's a Wonderful Life" instead. That is a time when creative people knew how to make entertaining movies for families.

This was a cute TV movie of the week that I discovered to be a lot more fun then I would have ever thought. Melissa Joan Hart's character is a down and out waitress that kidnaps Mario Lopez and takes him home to her family, forcing him to be her boyfriend. I've never seen such a storyline before, and the silliness of it all was made it so great. The actors who played the parents were a lot of fun, even a visible aged Markie Post. Sorry I just keep thinking of her "Night Court" days back in the 80s, and it's harsh to see her so worn out and old looking. The only other bad thing was that Hart wasn't as pretty or hot as she could be, she is not in the same "league" of Mario Lopez so that part of the story was a bit hard to swallow to. But then again, she's the chick and he's the man, so if she's less attractive then audiences are probably more willing to buy it then if it were the other way around. I am a straight guy, but I found myself sitting there thinking how hot Mario Lopez was, and forgetting about the female leads.