Here’s the 411: this movie is a sequel. Have I seen its predecessor? No. Basically all you need to know that A Street Cat Named Bob (the first film) is based on a true story about a man living on the streets of London with a nefarious drug habit, who turned his life around one day when he met a stray cat on the street and named him Bob.
A Christmas Gift From Bob is the follow up to the above true story, and is also based on the real life of the man in question. This time, however, leading man James now has his own small, simple flat in the city, and lives there (indoors!) with the titular cat. The movie focuses on an extremely mean animal control inspector, who is hell bent on getting Bob taken away from James. Their saving grace? The community comes together to show the tyrant that Bob is well-loved and properly looked after by not only James, but by them also.
I’m not going to sugar coat this: Jacqueline Wilson is the best actor in this movie. Okay, they’re not all bad, but there’s some extremely questionable acting in this. (Leading cat notwithstanding.) Thankfully, Luke Treadaway takes the main role and is decent enough, but the supporting cast leave a lot to be desired. Wooden and devoid of feeling, many of them seem as though they are simply reading off a script rather than bringing any sort of realism to the whole thing.
As I’ve already mentioned, I’ve never actually seen the original movie, but (unsurprisingly) you don’t really need to. It’s a really simple story with fairly little point to it, but it does have a good amount of heart and will help you to feel relatively festive. In short, it’s exactly what you want from a Christmas movie, even if it has barely anything to do with Christmas and rather is just set during the festive period.
Everything about A Christmas Gift from Bob is predictable, and you can absolutely tell where it’s going at every turn, but it’s still entertaining enough for you to feel some sort of investment in it. Maybe it’s because of Bob – he is the USP, that’s for sure – but you’ll find yourself actually caring about what happens, and that’s always a good characteristic for any movie to have.
While it does get a bit drivelly and long about an hour in, which makes it all feel a bit more like a long episode of a British TV show, the sentiment is still there. Glad tidings and all that, after all.
Will I ever think about this movie again? There’s a 99% chance that I will not. However, it’s a sweet, low budget movie that will give you the warm and fuzzies. Not bad, just fine, and good enough to occupy your mind whilst you eat your 28th Ferrero Rocher of the day.
A Christmas Gift from Bob is available to stream on Amazon Prime Video in the UK.
TQR Category Ratings:
Performance: 
Cinematography:
Soundtrack:
Costume & Set Design:
Plot:
Overall Enjoyability Rating:
The Quayside Review 