Christmas for a Dollar

2013

Action / Drama / Family

2
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Upright 71%
IMDb Rating 7.0/10 10 803 803

horse family relationships family poor christmas father son relationship

Director

John Lyde Photo
John Lyde

Top cast

Jacque Gray Photo
Jacque Gray as Mary Margaret Kamp
Brian Krause Photo
Brian Krause as William Kamp
Skyler M. Day Photo
Skyler M. Day as Esther
Cathleen Mason Photo
Cathleen Mason as Mrs. Bigler
720p.BLU
923.46 MB
1280*720
English 2.0
PG
29.97 fps
1 hr 40 min
Seeds 1

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by 7 / 10

A family Christmas film set during the Great Depression

"Christmas for a Dollar" is a good family Christmas film set during the Great Depression. It was filmed in Utah. The IMDb film page with writers credits lists Gale Sears and Bon Sowards, as based on their book. The DVD case has it a little different, saying the film is "Inspired by a true story."Gale Sears wrote the 2009 novel of the same title, and Ben Sowards illustrated it. It's a story about the Kamp family that lived in Bakersfield, California. It takes place in 1931, the year after William Kamp's wife died at age 37. In the film, William has five children. The oldest daughter and son, Verna and Warren, help with the chores, the cooking and raising the three younger children. But, Norman, who has polio, and Ruthie with their pet dog, have the biggest roles.It's a good family film for the Christmas holidays. As some others have noted, it has a little touch of the Waltons in the 1971 TV Film, "The Homecoming: A Christmas Story." The film setting is much more rural than the Bakersfield of 1930 that had a population over 26,000. Here the Kamp children are all in the same one-room schoolhouse.The movie has a very noticeable continuity gap at the end. Mrs. Rathbone has brought her horse over for Norman to ride, and says she will see them all later in church. The family is outside their home as Verna leads the horse around the yard with Norman riding it. There's no sign of snow on the ground or buildings all around. The next scene opens with trees, a wooden fence, the ground and the church in the background all covered with a couple inches of snow.This is a slower moving film, but one about a family enduring hard times, caring for others and sharing, and getting along.
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Reviewed by phd_travel 6 / 10

A change from Hallmark fluff

Watchable Christmas movie. These movies are supposed to be uplifting. But nothing seems to go right for these kids in a family struggling without their mother in the depression. So it's more serious than the usual Hallmark movie.

There is an injured horse and a missing dog and a bunch of bullies and an outspoken cute girl and a older nurse wannabe and a budding romance and a mean old horse owning woman. It's okay if you want a change from Hallmark fluff.

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