Homeless for the Holidays (2009)

Sorry, this movie sucks

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

Yo, there's no way for me to review this film without saying, take your *insert ethnicity + "ass" here* to see this film,like now. You have to see it in order to know what you're really messing with.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Young Matt Moore is an up and coming advertising executive who is living the American dream with wife Crystal DeWitt-Hinkle and their two kids. But it's all yanked out from under him and at Christmas time as well. He loses his job because he takes one for the team and his sacrifice of his job prevents his company from being subject to a lawsuit. He gets promised that his job will eventually be restored, but that turns out to be empty promises.I saw this happen a number of times especially after the World Trade Center disaster when the sole breadwinner was taken from the family. DeWitt-Hinkle has a teaching credentials, but it will take a few months to get her recertified and Moore winds up working in a fast food joint.This particular Christian film says that God will look after his own if you have a generous spirit. We see Moore and his family who've really got the spirit of Christmas give to some homeless people, to a collecting Santa Claus. Come tomorrow though and watch Christian television and that spirit will be translated into give to this particular nattily dressed reverend so he can enjoy a most opulent lifestyle doing God's work. Somehow I don't think God had that in mind.There were some worthwhile scenes that hit home for me. My favorite is DeWitt-Hinkle trying to get food stamps and dealing with the income levels needed for them. She can't feed her family, but they have too many assets like a van that is paid for free and clear. Sell the van so you can qualify to be fed. Last year I had a friend who sustained seizure disorders and had to take a pay cut from his fast food job in order to qualify for Medicaid. Hopefully Obamacare will remedy that.The family does become Homeless For The Holidays, but it all works out in the end. I've seen far worse Christian films, this is not a bad one from that genre.

This is one of the worst movies I have ever seen. I somehow ended up ordering this movie on the zune marketplace and boy do I regret it. The first scene of this movie has some kid talking about money and stockmarkets. This kid is basically a robot and the character has no appeal to young viewers. The acting is really bad. It seems like the acting in porn if they took out all the sex and dirty words. Why should I care about this Jack guy? He only cares about himself, you never see him spending time with his kids and he's always ignoring his wife. I was actually rooting against him, he's not a good guy. The check out scene? Really five minutes of BLAH BLAH BLAH with no point. How does this stuff get made? I have a feeling somebody bamboozled some good Christian people into investing in this movie. I am at the 44th minute of the movie and would not be able to live with myself if I wasted another minute of my time watching this. Anybody who says this movie has any sort of entertainment value is mentally ill.

This was a cute and wholesome movie with a good moral.However, the acting was a bit rehearsed...as in never left dress rehearsal. I did read that the whole budget was only $20,000 and the acting was done for free...so in that regards I guess it was not bad. Here is my gripe....I could never suspend disbelief during the movie. It kept me from connecting to the movie, it's characters, and even the message to a degree.Picture this...you lose your job...your utilities are being disconnected, you can't feed your family and must apply for food stamps...yet you drive 2 newer cars and have a baby grand sitting in your living room...picture this...you are going to lose your home in 5 days...you have snowball fights and cookouts and are willing to spend you last $40 on a dinner out (who needs gas in your only remaining vehicle?!). I'm sorry, I just couldn't get past it. Why not sell some stuff to get by? Anything is better than nothing when you are about to lose it all.So, yes, good overall moral message...but I do not see how people gave this movie 10 stars. I give it 5. It was OK, but it just made me angry at times. I couldn't suspend disbelief to connect to the movie very well.

It's a bad sign when the little kids are better actors than the adults in a movie. I must admit that this flick did do a good job of capturing the ethos of low-life trash. However I was jarred when, rather than those trash learning how to take control of their lives and redeeming themselves, they ended the movie as the same low-lifes but the heroes of the town. The main point of the story was that, when the mean old world is bad to you, you look around for signs from God telling you how to make the best of your bad situations. That is Christianity? No, it is not. Heroes are bums living in the park because the economy is bad, waiting for handouts or a top executive position to drop into his lap, rather than people shucking all their bad habits and taking steps to climb out of the gutter? Not in my world. Nor is the movie very well-made.How many of these almost universal ten-star voters are regular IMDb posters? 40 of the 43 other reviewers here (so far) have made this their only IMDb review ever! 3 other (besides me) reviewers have found this movie wanting. Why is almost every reviewer listed simply as "from United States"? Apparently to try to disguise their all being connected (as in either the same person or all knowing each other). Does the IMDb look kindly on this "Christian" way of trying to share info about a movie? I hope not.