Personally, I love Christmas movies. Old, new, serious, silly -- there's a wide variety of what my family and I see each year. But they only really speak to me during the Christmas season, which for me doesn't start until the day after Thanksgiving. So watching and evaluating new Christmas movies outside of these silly, self-imposed parameters is a risky endeavor. Stream this movie on Afdah live.
But there are big hints about the truly funny and uplifting Christmas drama, "The Greatest Christmas Pageant Ever," directed by Dallas Jenkins. Written for the screen by the trio of Ryan Swanson, Pratt Clark, and Darin McDaniel, this heartwarming family film is an adaptation of Barbara Robinson's popular 1972 children's novel. How to make something new A perennial favorite at Christmas time.
"The Greatest Christmas Pageant Ever" uses a similar framework to the beloved Christmas classic, "A Christmas Story." It's a story about a narrator who tells a meaningful story from his childhood. But instead of bespectacled Ralph, we have Emmanuel, a cozy little town with his mother Grace (the wonderful Judy Greer), father Bob (Pete Holmes) and brother Charlie (Sebastian Billingsley Rodriguez).
Emmanuel is probably best known for two things: its annual Christmas play, soon to celebrate its 75th anniversary, and for the sweary, quarrelsome, bullying, swearing, stealing and occasionally setting fires in the city. Of course, everyone in Emmanuel knows the family of six quarrelsome hardmen: Ralph, Leroy, Claude, Ollie, Gladys and their stern leader, Imogen.
Everyone is expecting this year's game to be the biggest ever. But the longtime organizer and director, a strict woman, Armstrong (Mariam Bernstein) falls and breaks both her legs. With no one to take over the reins, Grace volunteers to lead this year's beauty pageant, a noble endeavor that proves more difficult than she expected.