Watch This Christmas

The Whitfield family gathers together after four years of being apart. The theme is: each family member has a secret. The head of the family Ma’Dere (actress Loretta Devine) has two significant secrets. One secret is: she has divorced her spouse. The second secret is she is co-habitating with her new love interest. Character Joseph (played by Delroy Lindo) is her boyfriend.

The secret portion of the film and the household members’ talkativeness makes the comedy a very active type of movie. The film’s writer and director is Preston A. Whitmore II. Mr. Whitmore does an excellent job of keeping the comedy action-packed and interesting.

Ma’Dere’s one son is married to a woman of another race. Ma’Dere is African-American; and that said, it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out so is her household. Her daughter is the kind of woman who thinks she is of a higher echelon than the rest of the human race. However, Ma’Dere’s daughter’s husband has the last laugh on the daughter; since he sneaks behind her back with other women. Ma’Dere also has a son who owes some very questionable characters money. These two men would like to break the son’s limbs. Then there is her last born son named “Baby” (a nickname) who is scared to tell Ma’Dere about his most sincere dream. The household of Ma’Dere, once again is just full of secrets.

Ma’Dere, as alluded to above is played by Loretta Devine. If you are a regular film-buff you may remember her from “Grey’s Anatomy, “Down in the Delta” and “Dreamgirls. The other members of cast are played by: Columbus Short, Sharon Leal, Lauren London, Regina King, Idris Elba, and Chris Brown.

The members of household are very talkative so it is amazing each person has a secret at all. However, it is a reasonably realistic film; with very comedic content. As certain issues are uncovered and become overwhelming: problems are successively fixed. The cast members also engage in a great deal of holiday eating which makes the seasonal aspect seem all the more genuine. And conclusively, as the issues and problems get resolved, each member of cast has one particular scene or two where his or her secret/issue comes to the forefront and is subsequently and finally mended.

The musical aspect of the movie is most enjoyable. The son nicknamed Baby wants more than anything to be a singer. Ma’Dere’s one son is already a musical artist: that is the son being chased by the “bad” men who want to break both his legs. Ma’Dere would like Baby to become involved in a more established-type of career. The youngest son (named Baby) is played by Chris Brown. Brown can easily sing any song: classical or otherwise--beautifully. Baby proves his singing ability when Ma’Dere finds out his secret. During a church scene, too; another musical artist, Denetria Champ presents a grand performance.

The family has no more issues than most American families. The idea of the movie though is they tend to their secrets and issues during a forty eight hour holiday period. The film is full of action and has a great deal of substance

This Christmas is a 2007 comedy. It has received moderate reviews from critics and viewers, who have given it an IMDb score of 6.4 and a MetaScore of 63.