Christmas Movie #1: Holly Star

“Home for the holidays, a broke puppeteer knows there’s a treasure buried somewhere under her town.  To find it all she has to do is die – almost.”

You had me at "broke puppeteer."

We open with a bunch of people in a warehouse kind of place, making a soda commercial.  There are three people dressed in full-body blue leotards, with gloves, working a few small puppets on a little set.  They look weird, but we get no explanation for these get-ups.  Since their arms reach into the set to manipulate the puppets, I imagine it's some kind of suit that becomes invisible on film?  Like a green screen situation...?  Actually, I don't even know what a green screen does.  But let's not spend too much time on this.  We need to talk about the puppets.

 

They're old-timey wooden puppets and they are terrifying.  The gist of the commercial is that Santa needs his "Wizz" (I don't want to drink a drink called Wizz) to get energy to perform his duties. So there's a Santa puppet, and others.  But the execs decide they want to "go in another direction" and the puppeteers get fired.  

One puppeteer is a pretty gal named Sloan.  She packs her bags and heads home to her family in Winter Harbor, Maine, for the holidays. 

She is greeted at the train station by her best friend, Kay K.  We're going to call her KK in this recap because that's easier to read.)  KK is wearing a camo jacket so obviously we are to understand that she is a rough-and-tumble townie.

Sloan gets to her house and it seems her parents went on a cruise.  She forgot about this.  But they left her Grandma's old car for Christmas!  I mention the car because it is a '63 Nash Rambler, and I will never not laugh at a Rambler reference.  Once I was at a bar in Chicago with Ellen, and she introduced herself to a guy as, "Ellen Nash.”  She leans in: “As in Nash Rambler."  Oh, Ellen.  That still makes me laugh.

Anyhoo, we meet a few people in town.  Grandma lives at an old folks’ home.  There are some over-the-top Maine accents.  The town sure looks pretty -- snow on the beach, holiday decorations.

Then Sloan slips on the ice and cracks her head on the ground.  Oof!  She has near-death flashbacks of creepy puppets doing things… The Santa puppet she was working at the job site digs a hole in the snow and mumbles, and it appears he’s burying a bag of treasure.  There is also a baby Sloan puppet looking out a window and it has a baby voice.  It’s disturbing. 

Sloan comes to and drinks a lot of beer with KK.  She is now convinced there is buried treasure in town, based on her life-passing-before-her-eyes vision of puppet Santa digging around in the snow.  She has zeroed in on the phrase “55 Holly Star,” which is something revealed by the Santa grandpa.  Whatever could it mean?

Sidebar: Sloan has a ton of cute clothes for a broke girl.  She shows up throughout the movie wearing at least 10 different coordinated winter coats, scarves, and hats.  Maybe she bought this wardrobe when she was making all that bank as a working puppeteer.

We run into Andy, a guy who runs his family’s Christmas tree lot.  They’re old friends from growing up.  He’s rugged, he’s cute, he went to Bowdoin, and he has a broken arm from playing hockey.  

Sloan takes a job at the Christmas tree lot because she really needs the cash even though she looks down her nose at the job.  Sloan is a little bit of a snob.

KK runs a paintball place.  Sloan stops by and unexpectedly gets pelted with paintballs which is kind of funny on screen but also kind of mean, because she doesn’t have a vest on.  I think those things are supposed to hurt?

So Sloan keeps dreaming about the creepy Santa puppet (who we now understand represents her grandfather, a drunk puppet-maker who is now deceased) and really becomes obsessed with finding this buried treasure.  It’s a little off-putting.  I mean, I know she needs cash, and who doesn’t want to find a bag of money, but she is pretty obnoxious about it.

One evening, Sloan and KK visit a local joint called the Star Bar, because they want to investigate whether this “Star” reference is relevant to the 55 Holly Star puzzle.  They chat with the owners and learn the tale of the “lobster wars” from back in the day.  The owners bring out photos.  Gunther Dinglich (looks like Captain Kangaroo) was a bad guy, a fisherman who was going to wipe out the Maine lobstermen, somehow, I don’t know, but it was a “turf war.”  He hires a guy named “Bones Bradley” who looks like Matt Lauer but then Bones becomes a double agent and tells the lobstermen about the plot to sabotage the lobster boats.  Anyway, I have no idea what happens after that.  This story is complicated and also boring, and my eyes are glazing over.  The point is, there is possibly a bag of cash out there, but no one is sure, and it’s also possibly just a tall tale.

Sloan decides she needs to have another near-death experience in order to have the flashes of insight appear again.  She tells KK to pretend kill her.  There’s a car scene; it doesn’t work.

Segment where Sloan and Andy have awkward interactions, goofing off.  He is into her, and she is obtuse and/or ignoring it.  THEN!  They walk outside at night, to her car, and a masked madman appears and SHOOTS Sloan, right in the chest!  Andy is scared, and tries to help… but Sloan is like, “It’s fine, it’s a paintball…” because KK was trying to scare her into a near-death experience.  Andy is horrified, and correctly calls out Sloan for wanting the bag of cash so much she would fake die for it.  He decides they have different life values and leaves.

Sloan attends a Christmas Eve party at the old folks’ home.  It’s nice, until she chokes on a candy cane – uh oh!  It’s for real this time!  She sees the scary Santa again and he says, “Dig deeper!”  Somehow that makes Sloan run out to find Andy in town.  I don’t know, I think “dig deeper” is kind of vague, but this is another plot hole I do not care to spend too much time on.

Sloan finds Andy at the drive-in.  We’re told it’s tradition to go to the drive-in on Christmas Eve.  Sorry, sidebar again, I have issues with this. Aren’t you freezing?  We’re in Maine in December.  I don’t think you’re allowed to leave your car running the whole time at the drive-in.  You’re sitting in that freezing car for 2 hours?

All right, so she gets in Andy’s car and tells him the recent mental flashes before death were actually all moments with him as they were growing up.  That those were apparently the best moments of her life and now she’s ready to admit it.  He clearly still thinks she’s nuts and seemed like he wasn’t that into her after she got obsessed with looking for a bag of treasure, but then she kisses him and he’s apparently okay with overlooking all that.  

The End.

But wait!  SPOILER ALERT:  Andy and Sloan are taking apart the Christmas tree farm after Christmas and there is a sign in the farm that reads “$55 for HOLLY & STAR” (whatever that means).  COULD THERE BE TREASURE AFTER ALL?  We’ll never know because Sloan and Andy get in a wacky snowball fight with KK and the movie ends and we never know if they ever see the sign.

The End End.

I liked the scenery.  I felt chilly and I could smell the pine trees.  The story was unusual, and pretty cute, if a little bland. 

Would Meredith enjoy this:  I doubt it.  It’s not very exciting.  

Would Mary Louise enjoy this:  Does she like puppets? 

Note:  I’m sorry, this was a really long recap.  The rest of these commentaries will definitely not be this long.