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Holiday In Handcuffs

The winter holidays are a funny time of year. They ostensibly link us all together through the spirit of community and, for some, religious ritual. But whether you celebrate Hanukkah, Christmas, Mawlid, Festivus, or all (or none) of the above, holiday traditions are like snowflakes: No two are alike.

Take Christmas specials, for example. We all know the big titles—A Charlie Brown Christmas, It’s a Wonderful Life, Home Alone—but there are always a few lesser lights that you and the family can’t resist firing up every December. Perhaps those are a few schmaltzy TV movies from Hallmark or Lifetime, since your grandma probably has one of those channels on a constant loop throughout the month. None of these movies are actually good, mind you. The jokes creak, and the heartstrings are played like a cynical violinist only in it for the cash. What if one was actually kind of amazing, though? If you happen to be hanging out with your grandparents one winter’s night and just happen upon ABC Family at just the right time, a diamond might bubble up from the sludge.

Holiday in Handcuffs is just such a movie. On its surface, the special seemingly has very little going for it. ABC Family produced and broadcast the movie in 2007 as part of their bid to compete against Hallmark’s wall-to-wall holiday coverage. (Worth noting: This was before shows like The Secret Life of the American Teenager and Pretty Little Liars made the network a powerhouse among the 13-18 demographic.) The above-the-line talent wasn’t much to speak of, either. Melissa Joan Hart was stuck in limbo between Sabrina the Teenage Witch and Melissa and Joey; director Ron Underwood’s career had peaked in 1991 with City Slickers, and bottomed out in 2002 with The Adventures of Pluto Nash; Mario Lopez…well, Mario Lopez still looked pretty.

Thankfully, on that fateful December night in 2007, I decided to be a good sport and watch the movie’s premiere with my grandmother while we inhaled Oreos and milk. It was a revelation. I was not anticipating anything magical when I read the synopsis: Madison, WI twentysomething and struggling artist Trudie Chandler (Hart) kidnaps real estate developer David Martin (Lopez) in the diner where she works in order to pass him off to her parents as her boyfriend, since her d-bag ex dumped her so he wouldn’t have to spend the holidays with her family. Hijinks ensue, and of course they eventually fall in love. The direction is functional at best, given the low-budget basic cable trappings with which Underwood had to work. Schmaltz and family values win out in the end, right?

Wrong. After a few minutes, the metaphorical knives come out. Trudie and her family may not actually be all that stable. They’re emotionally repressed, acerbic, and secretive. David’s fiancee is a stuck-up heiress who only wants to rescue David so as not to interrupt their perfect wedding plans. And Trudie’s grandmother (the wonderful June Lockhart) is a hard-drinking, tough-talking, salty-ass broad who would rather not spend the holidays stuck with her square family.

There’s nothing ABC Family-friendly about this tableau of grotesques. Trudie holds a man at gunpoint on a whim. Her parents are the ultimate suburban perfectionists, her brother a closeted golden boy, her sister a thieving princess. An old gas station attendant helpfully provides some pink furry handcuffs to Trudie–you know, for the kinky shit. At one point, I honestly thought that John Waters had ghostwritten the script.

I don’t want to spoil too much more. Suffice it to say, Holiday in Handcuffs is so deliriously absurd that it ends up subverting the very feel-good nature of the Christmas special. Now, every December, my grandmother and I sit down with a few drinks to laugh at the Chandlers’ shenanigans. We made a new holiday tradition from the most unexpected of raw materials. Jump on board, everyone.

[Holiday in Handcuffs is now streaming free —no cable subscription required— on the ABC Family website and on the Watch ABC Family app as part of their “25 Days of Christmas” series]

Evan Davis is a regular contributor to Howler Magazine, Deadspin, and formerly to Film Comment. He lives in New York City. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram.