Continuing my free fall through the Pluto TV 'Christmas movie' we have 'A World Record Christmas'. A 'unique' christmas film that teaches us about autism, Jenga blocks and the power of family love.

The plot follows Charlie, an autistic pre-teen on a mission. A mission to break a world record! FOR CHRISTMAS!

His mother and step dad are very supportive of Charlie in his endeavours, and after a VERY long time of Charlie decides on his challenge, hes going to break the record for the most Jenga blocks stacked on a single brick. The records 1140, but Charlie's confident itll be a synch.

But Charlie's got an uphill battle on his hands, as he battles with the symptoms of his autism to keep his cool in front of crowds, television crews and his crush, AND managing the pain of his absent biological father.

And what we have here is…well, its a movie thats for sure. The main plots fine…but there are several odd dialogue choices throughout, the opening and closing acts are fine. But this thing drags HARD in the middle. At times the film is delicate to autism and how its presented…but when the plots floundering, it isnt above using Autism as a 'convenience' to move things along. Which I wasn't particularly impressed by.

At times, the film just feels a bit awkward, like its stalling, but doesnt have anything to do to make the stalling blend into the plot.

On the whole the characters are very generic, but nontheless charming. Its just…tonally a bit all over the place and lacking really pointed focus.

Direction and cine are actually pretty solid for films of this budget and subgenre. But it doesnt really push the boat out. Its just fine enough at what its trying to do.

The performances range from pretty good, to overly schmaltzy, to border robotic. Theres a degree of animation to the performances. Ill give it that. But 'unremarkable' is about as good as it gets.

And the score is largely library tracks…its fine, it suits the tone of the film and rarely feels misused.

All in all? This is one definitely not worth going out of your way for. But I enjoyed dipping in and out of it while winding down this evening. By a hairs breath id say if its on, it may be worth sticking around for. But its absolutely not worth going out of your way for it.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/a-world-record-christmas/