TrueJoshNight
Truly Dreadful Film
Janae Milner
Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.
Patience Watson
One of those movie experiences that is so good it makes you realize you've been grading everything else on a curve.
Amy Adler
Ruby (Dolly Parton) is a two-bit country music performer, making the rounds at the local watering holes. On a day near Christmas, she goes to the parking lot after her act and gets a surprise. Her boyfriend is cheating on her in a "pickup" romantic tryst. Most unhappy, Ruby breaks off their relationship and gets behind the wheel of her own car. As can be expected, the singer is so upset that she doesn't pay attention to the road and crashes, fatally. At the pearly gates, Peter (Roddy McDowall) tells her she can't have her wings just yet. In her former earthly life, it seems Ruby had too many misspent days and nights. Now, the songstress must go back to earth as a nanny and help a widower, Ben (Brian Kerwin) and his family rediscover the joys of the holidays, after their loss. When Ruby gets to the house, she finds they need her desperately. Ben has thrown himself into his work and neglects his two children. The teenage daughter is picking inappropriate friends and actions, in search of attention, and the elementary aged son spends way too much time playing video games alone in his room. Slowly, Ruby works her magic. But, since her deadline, no pun intended, is December 25, will Ruby earn her wings? This is likely to be a film that the whole extended family can enjoy around the holidays. Parton is lovely, talented and funny while the rest of the cast compliments her well. How nice to see McDowall and in a comedic role. The look, sound, and pace of the movie is also pleasing. Be a lesser angel to your own loved ones and find this one for them.
moonspinner55
Rebounding from her first foray into seasonal TV-movie fare (the forgettable "Smoky Mountain Christmas" from 1986), Dolly Parton tries again with this holiday-themed, sentimental confection...and does a very commendable job. A down-on-her-luck singer named Ruby Diamond (!) gets herself into a fatal car wreck and is later turned away from Heaven by St. Peter until she earns her wings on Earth by bringing a dysfunctional family together (under the guise of a cleavage-baring nanny). The brood consists of a widower father (the eternally-constipated Brian Kerwin), his snotty teenage daughter and alienated young son (who joins Dolly in a piano-and-guitar duet on "Jingle Bells"!). Dolly doesn't have to work hard at this role--the writers have already supplied Ruby with an angelic disposition that is hard to humbug, a background in country music, and childhood memories that just reek of smoky mountain holidays in Tennessee. Director Michael Switzer keeps Dolly feisty and funny throughout, and her rapport with saint Roddy McDowall is sweet, but the movie isn't very enticing on an emotional level. The kids merit little interest, the relationships between the adults is occasionally unclear, and small details such as where Dolly hangs up her fabulous wardrobe remain sketchy at best.
neilc42
I liked the movie. Predictable but entertaining. I'll have to admit, I'm a Dolly fan! She always plays good parts. Even in Nine to Five, she meant well in everything she did. The actors did an OK job of portraying their characters. CLEAN except for a few shots of Dolly. Language is fairly clean except for the word dam-it. Unfortunately it is all too true that the real world today focuses on the job, career, kids are left to fend for themselves, parents don't know how to be parents, etc. I would watch it again. Sometimes I think my grown up kids could learn some things, even from a simple movie like this one.Better than some of the trash out there these days.
redoubtable
This is one of the best junk movies of all time -- a complete howler. Watching the constant changes of costume -- every single one of which grossly accentuates Ms. Parton's already overly prominent most famous assets (would you hire a nanny dressed like that?) -- is alone worth the price of a rental. Add a screenplay full of clunker lines, a supporting cast earnestly trying to make something of this syrupfest, and, best of all, a wildly retro concept of heaven, and you've got the ingredients for a movie so excruciatingly awful that, by some miracle of transference, it's really rather sublime.