Alice Oscura, Featured Writer
There’s a common misconception that most Christmas-themed movies tend to have the same plot and ending result. While this may be true, we must remember that the atmosphere surrounding Christmas comes with happiness, family, romance and a sense of giving and sharing which could kind of seem like wash, rinse and repeat. But, it’s all in the feelings people, that sense of euphoria that everything is going to be alright and there can be happy endings. I think that this becomes more important for us now more than ever due to what the world and everyone has been going through due to the covid-19 pandemic.
That’s why when a film like this one comes along and succeeds in bringing out the true Christmas spirit within us we need to stand up and take notice. The thing that absolutely blew my mind was finding out that “Operation Christmas Drop” is a real military humanitarian mission that is the longest-running humanitarian airlift in the world run by the United States Department of Defense. The tradition started in 1952 and is supported by the local communities of Guam and targets Micronesia, which is a subregion of Oceania, composed of thousands of small islands in the western Pacific Ocean. It is operated out of the Andersen Air Force Base and Yokota Air Base.
The film stars Kat Graham (The Vampire Diaries) as Erica Miller. She works as a Congressional aide to Congress woman Bradford (Virginia Madsen), who seems hell bent on closing a beachside Air Force base in Guam due to pressure from the Senate. Bradford sends Erica on an impromptu trip derailing her Christmas plans in order to assess and evaluate to find enough inefficiencies to warrant the closure. However, when Erica meets Captain Andrew Jantz (Alexander Ludwig from The Hunger Games, Vikings), she begins to have a change of heart and a reawakening of her broken Christmas spirit when he shows her the beauty and love of the native people.
The pacing can be a bit slow but trust me it helps in the development of making the audience travel along on the same journey as Erica by having our eyes opened to the natural beauty of the environment, the warm giving hearts of the people and the many military personnel that chose to stay behind on base for Christmas to help in the humanitarian mission of Operation Christmas Drop. It’s a slow build to something that totally gives you that atmospheric jubilation of something good being achieved and adding a bit of happiness into people’s lives who deserve it the most.
It was amazing to see the organisation and passion that went into the entire operation including the fact that the entire project is 100 per cent funded by donations. It reminds us that even though we may have so many things going wrong in our lives there are people out there that live and manage in worse conditions with no electrical connections, no pipe-borne water, and no access to communication or education.
The leads have excellent chemistry with each other, and the ending is super sweet. You get some cool underwater snorkeling shots and some beautiful landscapes. The supporting cast is very likeable, and they are extremely innovative. There’s a cool scene where they figure out to use coconut shavings to imitate a snow flurry. It’s guaranteed to put you in that Tropical Christmas frame of mind!
Alice’s Score: 7.5 out of 10
* A big shout out to our Funny Caption Friday winner Kalifa Sarah Clyne. If you would like to submit a funny caption then like and follow the Redmangoreviews Facebook page here. And for Alice’s review of Netflix’s Holidate you can click here.
Dark Alice has an old soul and a curious mind. I believe that anyone can be a hero and that the good guys should always win! I dislike cruelty to animals and think that they have far superior qualities to humans. My motto is there is no future without the past. I also have a weird penchant for Paranormal TV shows even though the slightest sound makes me jump.
I enjoy writing reviews and throwing in fun facts to pique the readers’ curiosity. My ultimate goal in life would be to become a published writer one day. You can find me as Dark Alice Reviews on Facebook, my Instagram is alice_oscura and my Twitter handle is @lise_veliz2. For more on me you can click here.