Switched for Christmas

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Lee Friedlander directs. Michael Marshall behind the camera. Randy Carter cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

• 184 minutes exactly — the "classic feature" runtime most directors aim for.
• 2Released 9 years ago.
• 3Directed by Lee Friedlander, shot by Michael Marshall. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
• 4Editor Randy Carter shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
• 5Candace Cameron Bure and Eion Bailey and Natasha Bure carry the top of the cast.
• 6IMDB entry: tt7038606 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

The technical file

Cinematography

Michael Marshall

Editing

Randy Carter

Production design

Rob Howeth

Costume design

Stefanie Lain

VFX supervisor

Christian Cardona

Stunt coordinator

Kathy Jarvis

Runtime

84 min · 1h 24m

Status

Released

Original language

EN

IMDB

Switched for Christmas (2017) ↗

Also by

Lee Friedlander

• 
  The Good Doctor

  2017 · ★ 8.5
• 
  Chicago Med

  2015 · ★ 8.3
• 
  Good Girls

  2018 · ★ 7.8
• 
  Double Daddy

  2015 · ★ 6.9
• 
  Sailing Into Love

  2019 · ★ 6.9
• 
  Groundswell

  2022 · ★ 6.7

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

• 

  ▶
  Preview - Switched for Christmas

  Teaser · Official

Community reviews

What people are saying

• Reno2018-02-04
  ★ 7/10

  Not your typical swapping place tale! The best part of this film is it was not your typical Christmas film. When it says 'Switched', that seems not interesting. There are many films on that theme, so you might think you are exhausted to take a chance on this. But this is a good, a decent one at least. Even though, it revolved on a silly concept, everything was told in a much better way. I meant very maturely, without any fuss. Chris and Kate a twin drifted away while growing into adults. Now on one Christmas eve they are brought together by their loving father. They envied each others lives, which led them to switch the place just for like a day as they did a long ago. But the following events made them stay a bit longer. For such deed, there's always waits a serious consequence to explode and how that affects these sisters are revealed in the climax. Only recently I've checked out Candance Cameron's 'Aurora Teagarde Mystery' film series and liked them. So I was excited for this to see her one more time. A much better Christmas film I've seen in this season. Because usually Christmas themed films are overwhelmed with nothing but Christmas elements. This one happened in the backdrop of Christmas, but the preference was given to other than that. Forget about the cliches, but still it is worth a watch. Nothing like children's films you've seen on the same theme. 6.5/10

  Read full review ↓

Key crew

• Production DesignRob Howeth
• Set DecorationEffney Gardea
• EditorRandy Carter
• Costume DesignStefanie Lain
• MusicCorey Allen Jackson
• Visual Effects SupervisorChristian Cardona
• Visual Effects ProducerScott D. Wheeler
• VFX ArtistChristian McIntire
• VFX ArtistJohn Huffnagle
• Second Assistant DirectorStephanie Fugleberg
• Stunt CoordinatorKathy Jarvis
• Executive ProducerCandace Cameron Bure
• Co-Executive ProducerAnthony Fankhauser
• Executive ProducerStan Spry
• Executive ProducerEric Scott Woods
• Set CostumerShantell Guy
• First Assistant DirectorJeff Fuller

Themes & keywords

What it's about, really

• twin sister
• identity swap
• woman director
• christmas

Release history · US

When it landed

• TV2017-11-26· Hallmark Channel

Also known as

International titles

• Christmas Sister SwapUS