Follow the heartwarming journey of 2 orphan girls whose only wish is to find a home for Christmas. With a little help from their guardian angels (Dick Van Dyke and Angela Lansbury), they discover miracles can happen when you believe.
The movie “Buttons: A Christmas Tale” would have been a hit back in the ’80s or even in the early to mid-’90s, but now the movie is too far gone technologically to entice children to sit and watch for an hour and a half. That would mean putting down their phones for no benefit in their opinions. Who will like this heart-warming Christmas movie? People born before 1985 and children grounded from electronics, and this is the only movie they can watch. It’s sad, though, because the movie comes with a stellar cast – all people the youth of today won’t recognize – and a beautiful Hallmark worthy plot. Robert Redford and Kate Winslet narrate the sappy yet sweet story about two orphan girls in the early 1900s.
If you are old enough to remember Pollyanna, you have a feel for the time frame and another orphan, but none of the sass. Now throw in a little Princess Bride storytelling, and you have Buttons. The movie does include nuns and angels though played by Roma Downey, Angela Lansbury, and Dick Van Dyke. But first, the movie starts with a little orphaned girl named Emily (Noelle Parker) who ends up sick with a fever on Christmas Eve. A nun (Downey) saves her from the orphanage and sneaks her into a children’s hospital where she gets a visit from her guardian angel (Lansbury), who tells her a story about another orphan from long ago named Annabelle.
The story spends a few moments, ensuring the audience remembers Emily but focuses on Annabelle and her angel Dick Van Dyke. Annabelle started out life in the green with two loving parents, a home, money, and all the hope of a wonderful life, then her dad died. Without dad’s income back in the early 1900s, the family struggled, and Annabelle’s mom had to find a job in a mill, which leads to her death as she too orphaned her daughter. Buttons follows Annabelle around each dark corner as she learns to leave her past behind and sew buttons, which is how she gets her nickname and the name of the movie. With the kindness of strangers and an angel, the young orphan learns to find the good in life again, just as Emily learns not to give up hope either.
One of the flaws of this movie is that it’s a musical. Maybe this isn’t a flaw to everyone, but for me, unless it’s a Disney princess, don’t stop to fill voids with meaningful songs, you will lose my attention just like this movie. Mind you, this film released on theater stages first in 2018 before turning into a film for your television. The film has a beautiful story to share, brimming with important, wholesome values and lessons for children, but good luck getting a kid to watch more than the first twenty minutes without a roll of duct tape.
Now available on Digital and DVD
My kids and I enjoyed it because its good and wholesome. Its about time a sweet film comes out. And just in time for Christmas. By the way Christmas is IN right now.😁🌲👼👰💗
My two year old son and I watched this heart warming film and my son had questions throughout the movie. ut I didn\’t mind conversing with him to explain what was going on, especially during the scary parts at the factory, the frozen lake with girl falling in, etc. Watching it at home makes it ok to talk with my son while doing this. The cast is great and the singing was wonderful. The image of using duct tape to shut up or keep your your kid still is abusive and shouldn\’t have been printed.
It’s called “sarcasm” DAD, get over yourself.