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The lost art of made-for-television movies

posted 13 years ago by jeffyoung1
3 replies | jump to latest

Aspiring young directors, filmmakers, screenwriters, take note of this movie, A CHRISTMAS WITHOUT SNOW, a good example of the lost Hollywood art of the economically-budgeted but good quality made-for-television movie.

I'm not claiming that "A Christmas Without Snow" is a great movie. Made-for-television movies never claimed to aspire for Oscar greatness. Made-for-television movies carry their own intrinic limitations, but within those acknowledged limitations, directors could produce excellent human drama, action, sci-fi, and horror.

You can see the, ahem, economic budget in this movie. There are no elaborate studio sets nor special effects. Made-for-television movies were mostly filmed in the same vein as an on-site television commercial. Yet I never decried made-for-tv movies for their lower production values. TV movies made up for lower production values by offering quality stories, actors, and acting. At the height of the TV movie, in the 70s and early 80s, the studios could even persuade actors and actresses who were at the top of their fame to act in TV movies. Some famous television series actors saw TV movies as a way to diversify their acting portfolio and avoid typecasting.

I remember Lynda Carter, famed as the television Wonder Woman, acting in a TV movie around the time of her famous sci-fi series, as an ordinary woman, being terrorized by a hoodlum, disguised as a priest, who was even shorter than the 5'10" actress. It was highly disconcerting to see Lynda Carter as an ordinary woman in the TV movie, unable to defend herself, being shoved face first against a door with her arms painfully pinned behind her back by the fake priest thug who was not only a thin man, but looked to be 2 inches shorter than her. But that's probably what actress Lynda Carter wanted highly, to show off her other drama acting talents, not just as Wonder Woman.

[–] jac91604 13 years ago

Great post.

I remember as kid ABC having the Tuesday movie of the week.

Some very well done TV movies.

[–] richard.fuller1 9 years ago

LOL!

That Lynda Carter movie was The Last Song, practically right after Wonder Woman left the air.

I was never a fan of the show Wonder Woman. As beautiful as Carter was, the show itself was overbearing and trite with its ideas.

For some incredibly odd reason, I watched The Last Song when it aired and managed to catch it years or so later as an afternoon flick and still found it intriguing, mainly for that priest bit.

Nicholas Pryor, who was killed between the trains in Damien: Omen II, played the part of the priest and looked absolutely maniacal.

There was a very fascinating bit about a hidden room as well, simply a secret recording room or something and how it was discovered.

I'm watching A Christmas Without Snow now and it's not overly stellar.

I used to catch this as a late movie on an independent station and would record it, but the reception was always bad, so I could never see the movie properly and didn't know what Michael Learned, John Houseman, James Cromwell, Beah Richards and Ramon Bieri had to do with a snowless Christmas.

[–] Eric-62-2 8 years ago

This remains an annual viewing tradition for me (courtesy of my 1985 WPIX recording). I have never seen a production that more realistically captures the essence of a Church congregation and choir as I've known it over the years. We see people for whom being part of a church community is a natural, ordinary thing in life. But they are not perfect saints because they are churchgoers and have their own problems and demons to battle with. Neither though are they the ridiculous caricatures Hollywood and elite institutions seem to think churchgoers are. It's that believability that makes "A Christmas Without Snow" special to me. The fact that the lives of some of these people are still not fully resolved by the time of the climactic "Messiah" performance is itself a realistic comment on how life is not full of neat, orderly conclusions, but neither must it seem hopeless (especially good to remember during the Christmas season).

Who knows, the lives of the people in this church and their realistic struggles could easily have made for a believable continuing series. Certainly more so than some of the disgraceful examples we've been served up in recent years (like "GCB").