Full disclosure. I fell asleep in the middle of this movie, but in my defense, I was in bed with this on at the time. Never the less, I wanted to log my review in order to compliment Micah Kalisch as the formidable teen daughter, the cheerful wholesome Lindy Booth, the ruthless boss, Damon Runyan, and even the guy that played the hero. I found him strangely appealing. The acting was outstanding. I'm going to go back and look at the middle. If I change my review, I'll let you know. But great casting and good acting can over-ride a lot of other flaws.

Piano teacher Lizzie Moore (Lindy Booth) has a never ending (and naseaous) smile that brims from ear to ear. The widower father Brad Evans (Robin Dunne) who apparently is a genius in making millions of dollars for his real estate firm also happens to be as dumb as a stump when it comes to romance. Brad's daughter Abigail (Micah Kalisch) starts taking piano lessons from Lizzie and takes up the cause with Lizzie to save the Brooklyn Music Institute school property from the realtor barons who have it tightly in their greedy grasp. Oooooooh sounds ominously familair to the (1951) A Christmas Carol eh?

I will not have to spoil the ending for anyone because the ending occurred when one of the elderly retired gentleman named Earl McKinley who is taking piano lessons continues to appear and re-appear in various scenes throughout the film which tells the audience he probably has something significant to do with the real estate firm that has purchased the music school building. Duhhhhhh!

The finale is a full house attendance for the annual Brooklyn Music Institute's Christmas Music pageant that music director Lizzie's music school is responsible for putting on annually. After a couple of young performers have achieved their two minutes of fame on the stage, on comes the elderly retired Earl McKinley who proceeds to say that his performance will be dedicated to his son who also happens to be in the audience, and who is the current President and CEO of the nasty real estate firm who is taking over the building to turn it into high end condos and commercial space, for that nasty thing called a profit....and at Christmas time. Bah humbug! Of course there are kisses and applause to save the school and to all a GOOD NIGHT!

This was a nice enough movie through the first three quarters. We had a love story. We had a villain. We had a rival love interest. We even had a crisis that needed a miracle.

I love Lindy Booth, so I can't be impartial about her. He bright joyful spirit would have made this movie enjoyable if there hadn't been anything else.

Unfortunately, I didn't Robin Dunne did his best work. He connected well enough with Lindy, but otherwise he seemed a little dull. I also loved Micah Kalish. I think her part might have worked better about 3-5 years younger, but Micah did a nice job. The villain was played by Damon Runyan and he was good as the heartless, unreasonable boss (even though from the bosses perspective it wasn't so unreasonable.) Cynthia was a little too forgiving as the rival, but Jennifer Gibson did OK too.

There was a ton of great Christmas music, especially on piano. We also had Christmas tree shopping including a random collision meeting of the future couple. We had bonding over Christmas traditions like baking cookies, and tree decorating.

***Ending SPOILERS from here on*** But this movie was all in the ending. We got several clues about Earl almost from the beginning. Many things about the ending were predictable, but they presented it all very well. More than one aspect of the ending was tear jerking with the last ornament on the tree being Lizzy overcoming her fear and putting on a Julliard worthy performance. I only wish it was longer.