Christmas on TV: "A Holiday for Love"

As made-for-TV Christmas movies go, this one is fairly quintessential. Let's just say if you were going to write the stereotypical made-for-TV Christmas movie, you would probably arrive at this one. If you were lucky. Because it's actually pretty good.

Here's the formula.

Take one widowed single mother in a small town in the Midwest.

Give her daughter an unimaginative yet holiday appropriate name, such as Noelle.

Add one single, secretly troubled corporate executive on a business trip to said small town.

Remember that widowed single mother has been engaged to the town sheriff for who knows how long, but will not commit to a date.

Have the executive get trapped in a snowstorm that causes him to spend his first night at the widow's home.

Add appropriate amounts of romantic banter, gently falling snow, glowing firelight, and almost kisses.

As the romantic tension between widow and executive builds, make sure he doesn't revealed his top-secret business plan to downsize the main tractor factory in town so there will be additional conflict.

Mix for thirty to forty-five minutes, until well jumbled.

Reveal said top-secret plan immediately after widow realizes she is in love with executive.

Have executive move return to the big-bad big city and express his last-minute, Christmas-spirit change-of-heart to the evil board of corporate executives.

Have executive return to small town on Christmas Eve, just in time to reveal his new plan to save the factory, find his long-lost father, and reveal his love to the widow.

Make the widow just stubborn enough to not accept his first admission of love.

End with a kiss in the lightly falling snow.

As Christmas on TV goes, it doesn't get much more formulaic than that. But with that said, I think the acting level in this movie and the excellent pacing counteract its utter predictability. After all, people watch these movies because they want to watch something predictable. At least, I know I do.

So if you're looking for a snuggly holiday movie, look no further than A Holiday for Love.

Star power: Melissa Gilbert from Little House on the Prairie, Tim Matheson (I definitely had a crush on him when he played the oldest brother in the original Yours, Mine, and Ours), Michelle Trachtenberg from Harriet the Spy, and even country "star" Travis Tritt
Use of made-for-TV Christmas conventions: villainizing corporate America with a small town, reuniting long-lost family members