Sissy Spacek stars in 'Pictures of Hollis Woods', Sunday on CBS.

Most Christmas movies are so pat, we know the ending from the start. Though adults may sit with children watching Frosty or Rudolph and enjoy these chestnuts, there are never enough new, great holiday movies.

Pictures of Hollis Woods, a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie on CBS Sunday, December 2, is that rare film. It stars Sissy Spacek as a retired art teacher whose heart exceeds her abilities, who takes in foster kid Hollis Woods (Jodelle Ferland).

Hollis, named after a section in Queens, N.Y., was left on a street corner when she was but an hour old. Understandably, she has a tough shell. A gifted artist who sketches works of beauty, Hollis is perfectly played by Ferland (Good Luck Chuck). Hollis has bounced around the foster care system and runs away when unhappy, leaving her with a spotty school record and a reputation as difficult. Given that she's 12, she must remain a ward of the state.

As they drive to yet another home, Edna Reilly (Alfre Woodard) says, "I'm a social worker, not a magician. We are running out of options for you."

Finally, it looks as if the right match is made. Josie Cahill (Spacek) continues to sculpt and paint in the warm home she shares with ornery cat Henry.

Big paintings

"Some of the paintings we use are of tulips I grew in my garden," Spacek says from her rural Virginia home. "I photographed them with my macro lens, and a painter in the art department did big paintings. They hung them sideways in the kitchen."

Though Hollis and Josie get along so well, soon enough there's a sign of trouble. Josie can't recall the name of a girl she had taken care of for years. Josie has Alzheimer's.

"The most difficult thing with the story, really, is not about someone with Alzheimer's; it's how it impacts this young girl and how the disease affects their relationship," Spacek says. "I didn't want it to impact the story. I wanted it to be subtle enough that I wanted it to work within the story, so we focused on that. I watched everything I could find about Alzheimer's."

Hollis loves Josie and her eccentric cousin, Beatrice (Judith Ivey, Flags of our Fathers), who lives in town and runs the local movie theatre. Hollis knows something is very wrong and tries to help Josie. Of course, being an adolescent, her judgment is not always spot-on, and she has a grand time cutting school and writing innovative absence notes to teachers.

The parallel story is that Hollis spends a summer with a family, the Regans, at their mountain cabin. This is the only confusing part of the movie and the book upon which it's based, as the story flits between the two families. Still, the characters are so strong that this doesn't matter much.

Lovely art kit

As usual, Hollis is cautious when taken to the Regans, but she grows to love them as the dad (James Tupper, Men in Trees) gives her a lovely art kit, which was his as a boy. Steve (Ridge Canipe, Walk the Line), his teenage son, teaches her to fish, and, in a move that will make adults recoil he teaches her to drive.

Much of the movie is straight from the book, though fans of the Newbery Honor young-adult book will notice changes. In the lovely novel, the social worker is a bit inept, and Hollis calls her Mustard Woman because of stains on her sweat shirts. Woodard's character, Edna, knows precisely what she is doing and is well-dressed.

The ending - which will not be divulged here - is very different, but it still works and is ideal for Christmas.

Authors usually become incensed when Hollywood takes such liberties with their work, but Patricia Reilly Giff doesn't mind.

"I am so willing to be pleased with everything because it was just such a wonderful thing for me to have that happen," she says from her Connecticut home. "It is kind of a lonely occupation, and you are never sure whether what you are writing is good. This was such an affirmation."

Giff was prompted to write the book as her mother, who had Alzheimer's, was dying.

"She had lived a long life, and just before she died she took my hand and said, 'I guess I'll never go home again,' " Giff says.

Foster care system

The author grew up in St. Albans, Queens, adjacent to Hollis, and knew many children like her main character. Giff taught reading to children, many of whom were in the foster care system. The cabin where the Regan family spends the summer is Giff's house in the mountains. Josie Cahill was the name of her mom's favourite aunt, and Henry, the irritable cat, was the name of her first cousin.

The movie is so beautifully shot and paced that even Giff found herself lost in it. She watched a review copy with her family, and her grandchildren laid out red paper to make a red carpet for her arrival.

"I was so mesmerised that when the truck comes down and they are going to have that accident, I kept saying, 'Oh, my God, they are going to crash!' Then I said to myself, 'You idiot! You wrote it.' So yes, I get lost in stories," Giff says.

And Pictures of Hollis Woods is a story well worth getting lost in.

- Jacqueline Cutler, Zap2it