A Chrismystery

Who ripped the Christmas guts out of a small town’s annual celebration? The answer lies in the intriguing holiday rom-com A Chrismystery, written by Sean Wathen and directed by Matthew Toronto. In a small town a lot like Savannah, Missouri, Leia (Kylee Levien) is making a clever Christmas video that no one on the planet is watching. She has put up the Christmas decorations like her dad loved to do until he passed.

Her mother, Deputy Annie (Jen Lilley), tells her she is wasting her time, as all the Christmas stuff will need to be boxed back up again when they move out in a few weeks. Annie grew up in this town and yearns to get back to a big city to be a real cop. Christmas to Annie is as dead as her husband, and being back in the sticks is suffocating. Leia hates that they have to move again, as she has avoided making friends because of it.

Sheriff Tom (Cody Mayo) doesn’t know Annie is taking another job and is still encouraging her to learn everybody’s name. Even though Annie grew up with all these people, she doesn’t remember the name of Doug (Drew Pollock), who owns the hardware store, or Ruth (Betsy Hume), the mayor of the town. The only reason she remembers Skylar (Deneysha Richard) is that she’s Leia’s teacher and was also Annie’s classmate back in the day.

“Who ripped the Christmas guts out of a small town’s annual celebration?”

As the town is small, crime isn’t all that rampant. On her latest call, Deputy Annie responds to an incident where Mrs. Crinshaw (Lisa Scott) believes one of her many cats has been stolen. However, this Christmas is not going to be as quiet as others. Sheriff Tom wakes Annie up for an emergency right in front of the courthouse: someone has taken the light-up nativity scene and Christmas lights ahead of the big ornament ceremony.

Because Tom cannot believe anyone in town is dastardly enough to commit such an atrocity, Annie is going to have to use her big-city investigation skills to expose the culprit. I love indie Christmas movies, particularly these U.S.-made regional productions. There is already a huge independent Christmas movie industry in Canada that supplies much to the widely seen cable content, so these homegrown pictures are indie upon indie.

Film like A Chrismystery are made to make people feel good, even if they are suffering. I like feeling good, as I have suffered plenty and enjoy these films unironically, as sometimes a happy ending with twinkling lights is just what my nervous system ordered. The clever script by Wathen immediately has the authentic air of the small-town kid who couldn’t wait to get out but finds his way back in.