Bringing Christmas Home is piled high with deeper themes and meanings for a simple Christmas movie. I found at least six themes that all come together at the end, like a nice wrapped Christmas bow.
In the beginning, we are met with Russell and Jules finding an old WWII veteran jacket in their antique shop. Russel calls for help on the never-failing internet, and Caroline responds. Together, as a holiday duo, they pair up to return the veteran jacket to its family before Christmas!
Sense of A Common Goal
Bringing Christmas Home is a beautiful movie that expresses the connection between humans that occurs when we all share a common goal. Caroline opens her heart to Russell about her time serving the army and the bond the togetherness brings. Ultimately, it becomes abundantly clear that this also applies to her and Russell.
Their love story blossoms throughout the movie because they are united with a purpose. We all know that finding purpose is our greatest goal and destiny. I wholeheartedly adore the film for injecting this theme. Overall, I wasn’t taken away by the movie, but I loved the themes within.
The film opens with Caroline talking to a student about her assignment paper. She suggests that the student needs to find a way to get into the minds of Soldiers and how, when they are all aiming for the same goal—the goal of returning home to their loved ones —that can be the only thing that gets them through.
Masculine and Feminine Balance
Admittedly, when I first began watching Bringing Christmas Home, I was taken aback by the duo of Russell and Caroline. Caroline was ex-military, and Russell was focused on community. Therefore, Caroline came into the movie strong, determined, masculine, and reserved. All the while, Russell entered soft, calm, nurturing, and vulnerable. Typically, you see and hear of these dynamics being switched. I was confused.
However, as the movie progressed, director Michael Rohl created a divine balance between the two characters. Though we typically may perceive these qualities as being the “wrong way around,” the couple still gave each other everything they needed, and that’s what mattered in the end.
In any relationship, there needs to be a balance. One side needs to be stable, assertive, and focused, while the other needs to be submissive, receptive, and emotional. The relationship in Bringing Christmas Home works perfectly because Rohl created this perfect duality.
Veteran’s Continued Service
Rohl delves into and injects many purposeful themes within Bring Christmas Home, but I didn’t suspect this one would be birthed into the film; thus, it was a genuinely beautiful surprise.
As Russell and Caroline search for Orin’s family, they meet countless military-based leads from old veterans. Rohl is trying to display here how much a Veteran will continue to offer his services to everyone around him to help and support others.
This, too, supports the first theme: a sense of a common goal. For veterans, helping and serving others will not only feel rewarding and memorable, but it will also bring back the sense of sharing in a common goal—again, a feeling they would’ve been all too familiar with.
Brokenness Shows Strength
A recurring theme throughout Bringing Christmas Home is that even though something may be chipped, broken, or damaged, it’s a sign of strength instead of weakness and failure. At this point in the movie, Russell shows Caroline a chipped figure that wasn’t purchased as part of a collector’s set – “the owner must’ve thought it wasn’t worthy of being an addition” (I paraphrase). Still, Russell continues to explain how something broken signifies resilience to hardship.
This is how Russell softens Caroline’s heart. She internally feels too fractured to be loved—a familiar feeling among humans.
Russell’s expression here, I believe, is one we all need to hear. We can find people in this world who will love us; despite all the darkness we carry in our hearts and minds. Someone is out there to show you you are still lovable despite your cracks and wounds.
This love is especially true from God. God loves you unconditionally – and this segments me into the next theme.
The Gift From God: True Love and Hope
Russell and Caroline’s discourse expresses their praise and gratitude to God for finding each other. I breathe a sigh of relief to see a movie encouraging this storyline.
The storyline shows how God can conspire to make the lives of two individual persons to find each other. Russell and Caroline know deeply that they met for a reason, and they believe this reason is God. In that shared sense of a common goal (to believe in a higher being), they blend to become one.
This is the hope and trust we must place in God (or however you define it)—that we will meet the person we are created to be with. We must put our hope in something grander than ourselves—we do not find true love alone; we are to be guided by the spirit.
Rohl planted virtuous seeds within his movie, which I hope many will take away, meditate, and reflect on for themselves. I loved this movie not for its corniness or just because it was a Hallmark Christmas Movie; initially, I was resistant, but I loved it because of the meanings and intentions within the film’s premise.
This movie has grown on me to the point where I would consider watching it again. Not many hallmark movies have that effect on me despite my enjoyment of them.
I’d love to know other opinions on the ending and themes of Bringing Christmas Home, so please comment below.
