Christmas Cupid

Christmas Cupid is a television film starring Christina Milian, Ashley Benson and Chad Michael Murray and directed by Gil Junger. It premiered on ABC Family on December 12, 2010 as part of their 25 Days of Christmas programming block. It was filmed under the name Ex-Mas Carol.

Plot

Sloane Spencer is a publicist in Los Angeles, California planning the Snow Angel movie premiere on Christmas day for her client Caitlin Quinn. Unfortunately for Sloane, Caitlin continually seems to find herself involved in press scandals. Sloane is under pressure to make this event perfect so that she is chosen for a promotion to Vice President instead of her ex-boyfriend and co-worker Jason. To help her in her climb to the top, Sloane is dating her boss Andrew, who is also the son of the head of the company. Sloane is so focused on herself and her goals that she often doesn’t consider the feelings of those around her, preferring to think only of herself. She makes plans to work all of Christmas Day rather than spend time with her mother, Vivian, or go to the dinner hosted by her friend from college, Jenny, and Jenny’s husband, Ed. Jenny and Ed opened a restaurant, but are now in financial trouble. After visiting them at their restaurant, Sloane promises to help them out by giving out gift certificates to their restaurant in her company gift baskets.

At a club that night Caitlin chokes to death on the olive from a martini. Her ghost comes back to haunt Sloane, telling her that her time is running out and she needs to change her ways or pay the price. Caitlin tells Sloane that for the next 3 nights she will be visited by 3 different ghosts at the stroke of midnight and they will give her a chance at redemption.

Sloane is shocked and confused when Andrew calls her to tell her that Caitlin has died, not believing that she just talked to a ghost. So, she decides to see the body for herself. At the hospital, Sloane runs into Patrick, her ex-boyfriend from college, who is a doctor at the hospital. Upon seeing Caitlin’s body, Sloane is clearly more upset about the implications for the movie premiere than the loss of a young girl. Sloane becomes even more flustered after being visited by Caitlin’s ghost again, and seeks consolation from Patrick. The spark between them is still there, and Patrick confronts Sloane about breaking up with him rather than going with him to medical school in Iowa.

The next day, Caitlin’s ghost continues to follow around Sloane, interfering in her every day activities. Andrew puts Sloane in charge of Caitlin’s memorial, and Sloane decides to combine it with the movie premiere. Consequently, everyone at the office has to work overtime, even on Christmas Day. Patrick calls Sloane and asks her out on a date, but she is torn and puts off having to give him an answer.

At midnight that night, Sloane is transported back in time and is visited by the spirit of "ex-mas past", her first boyfriend from high school, Brad. Together Brad and Caitlin show her Christmas when she was younger and how her mom shaped Sloane’s materialistic view on relationships. Brad shows Sloane how throughout her whole life, she has left guys hanging. In particular, Brad shows her when she broke up with Patrick by moving out while he was gone at class, leaving only a note. Sloane then sees that Patrick was planning on proposing to her. They then try to make Sloane see how after Patrick she went through a series of guys, always trying to trade up. Finally, Brad breaks the news to Sloane that Andrew is cheating on her with an unnamed blonde.

The next day at work Sloane confronts Andrew about his cheating. Andrew admits to it, but claims that it was only a one-time thing. He wants to continue dating, but Sloane breaks up with him. Afterwards, Sloane is only worried about how it will affect their career, making her competition with Jason for the promotion heat up even more. Sloane decides to use her dinner reservations that she had with Andrew to have dinner with Patrick instead. On the date, as she and Patrick are about to kiss, Andrew comes and proposes to Sloane. Sloane says yes, completely forgetting about Patrick.

At midnight that night, Caitlin and the spirit of "ex-mas present", Jason, show Sloane how her thoughtless actions affect those around her. Sloane observes her secretary Ella telling her son that she won’t be home on Christmas Day, Jenny and Ed talking about how Sloane takes her for granted, and her mom finding out that her husband won’t be home for Christmas and will be spending it completely alone. Last, Sloane discovers that Andrew was actually on the phone while talking to her about their engagement and sees how upset Patrick was. Both Caitlin’s ghost and Jason’s spirit want to show Sloane that if she continues on acting like she currently is, she is going to end up alone.

The next day Sloane attempts to fix the relationships in her life. She admits to Jenny that she forgot to put the gift certificates in the gift baskets, making Jenny very upset. Sloane then goes to visit Patrick at the hospital. Patrick is upset and tells Sloane that he doesn’t like who she is becoming, saying that he "could never fall in love with her now".

As she’s leaving the hospital, Sloane is visited by the spirit of "ex-mas future", who is dressed like Santa Claus. First, he shows Sloane: her mother's house, where Vivian is spending Christmas alone with the 3 dogs and the maid tried to get her to come join her family. She thinks her mother has gone crazy when she named one of the dogs after her and admits that she knows Vivian often refers the other two dogs as her younger brothers, but she's always seen her as a human being. The Santa spirit disagrees and tells her that Vivian was lonely because Sloane didn't even bother to come visit her when she needed her. After her mother suffers from another failed marriage with her fifth husband leaving her, she falls apart and has to depend on the dogs for support, which she is convinced that they love her more than Sloane did. The Santa spirit then brings Sloane to the future home of Jenny and Ed where they receive a Christmas card from her, which she refuses to read from. She discovers that Jenny's restaurant has failed and it forced her to be a waitress at Applebee's. Sloane tries to defend herself by telling him that wasn't her fault, but the Santa spirit doesn't believe her. He tells Sloane that she needs to accept responsibility for her actions because Jenny depended on her to save her restaurant by putting the gift cards in the basket for Caitlin's movie premiere/memorial. The Santa spirit mentions that because Sloane's thoughtlessness in caring for her own promotion, Jenny was convinced she couldn't be trusted and ended their friendship. He tells her they have one more place to go before he leaves. Outside the hospital, Sloane thinks Santa brought her there to show her how much Patrick hates her. He then tells her that she never sees Patrick again after accepting Andrew's proposal. He also reveals to Sloane that he thinks she's shallow and doesn't care for anyone else but herself. Outraged, she tells off the Santa spirit that she does care about love. Sloane mentions that since she's engaged to Andrew, he would never become her ex and they both love each other. The Santa spirit laughs at her naivety and tells her to think again. The Santa spirit reveals himself as Andrew, her future ex-husband, and shocking Sloane.

After recovering from her shock, Sloane confronts him and states they were supposed to be married. Andrew confirms they do get married, but also will be divorced because of their different lifestyles. Sloane is in disbelief by the truth, but he continues revealing that she wanted power and wealth. Whereas Andrew wanted to make his marriage with her work and declared they both got what they wanted. Even though he mentions that Sloane will become extremely wealthy from the divorce by taking half of his company and clients from him, Andrew tells her that she'll still lose everything and will show her what he means in it. Inside the hospital, she observes how happy other patients are to have family members visit them on Christmas and asks Andrew if he wasn't there to show Patrick's fate in the future, then why he's there in front of her. Andrew reveals that he's there to show Sloane the negative consequences of her actions when she continued behaving the way she did by caring for herself and pushing everyone out of her life. Inside her future self's hospital room, Sloane discovers that the people who were supposed to be important in her life are still angry with her for the way she willingly abandoned them in their ire of need and no one came to visit her on her final days. As a result, she has died alone like Jason and Caitlin predicted. Realizing her mistake, Sloane begs Andrew to help her fix this because this isn't the future she wanted. However, he refuses and leaves her, stating Sloane got what she deserved in the end. Before leaving, Andrew claims that had Sloane been more helpful and caring towards others, she wouldn't have been in the position she got herself into.

Sloane wakes up on Christmas Day determined to fix her life. First she goes to her mother's house to reconcile with her and drops her off at Jenny’s for Christmas dinner. She then proceeds to go to the movie premiere/memorial, where she gives her secretary permission to go home for the day and puts all of the gift certificates for Jenny's restaurant in the gift baskets. In the end, the event is a success and Sloane gets the promotion to Vice President. Right after Andrew tells her the good news, she breaks up with him when she realizes that he wasn't the man she was looking for. She tells him that she knows of his deception, thanks to a wireless Bluetooth earphone attached to his ear that lead to her hurting Patrick back on their date earlier, and gives Andrew back his ring. At this point, Caitlin has achieved her mission so she gets her wings and goes up to Heaven. Before leaving, she and Sloane make up, with Sloane admitting she is grateful that Caitlin helped change her life before it was too late. As Sloane is leaving the party, she and Jason end their competition on friendly terms.

Sloane goes to the hospital and apologizes to Patrick for what happened on their date the other night. She confesses her love for him and tries to convince him that she is still the same person that she was in college. However, Patrick has a hard time believing her and wants her to leave. He tells her that she still embarrassed him in front of others when she accepted her fiancé's proposal. Sloane admits she didn't realize how much she hurt Patrick until after accepting Andrew's proposal and learning about his deception at Caitlin's movie premiere/memorial. She also tells him that it's over between them for good. In the end, Patrick forgives her and they share a romantic kiss. Together they go to Jenny’s house for the Christmas dinner. The movie ends with Sloane making a Merry Christmas toast, surrounded by the people she loves and who love her.

Cast

• Christina Milian as Sloane Spencer
• Ashley Benson as Caitlin Quinn
• Chad Michael Murray as Patrick
• Jackée Harry as Vivian
• Ashley Johnson as Jenny
• Burgess Jenkins as Andrew
• Ryan Sypek as Jason
• Justin Smith as Ed
• Cara Mantella as Ella

Reception

During its broadcast premiere, the movie averaged 3.40 million viewers.^[1]

References

External links

• Christmas Cupid at the Internet Movie Database
• ABC Family