“Falling For Christmas” Film Review

A film review by the Viking Voice team

We hope you had a good Christmas! But perhaps, like many of us, you felt that there was a dearth of good Christmas movies to watch. In order to save you from the same dilemma next year, the Viking Voice reporters got together to watch the best Christmas film Netflix had to offer “Falling for Christmas”, and their thoughts are shared below.

The film is definitely a good way of catching that Christmas feeling. All our reviewers agreed that the movie got them into a Christmassy mood. However, our overall star rating was a middling three out of five. What were the good and bad points of the film?

A film review by the Viking Voice team

Our reviewers rated the music and the emotion of the movie most highly. It is, after all, a Christmas rom-com. The storyline was somewhat predictable and formulaic, while the acting was hardly outstanding, described by George as “terrible and cringe-worthy”. However, we thought that Lindsay Lohan was “a good choice as lead actor as she was able to convey how Sienna's mindset changed throughout the movie in a convincing way” (Aidan). Noah R agreed that she was able to show how spoiled she was at the start but then also how her character progressed.

Lindsay Lohan’s character, Sienna, is a hotel heiress who could not be more mollycoddled and spoiled. Until, that is, she has an accident, gets lost, and in the process loses her memory. That is when she meets Jake Russell, a local hostel owner, in a meeting that will change her life and values forever.

Oscar and Aidan’s most memorable moments in the film involved scenes with Sienna and Jake; for Oscar the scene when everyone gathered around to give money for the lodge, whilst for Aidan it was the scene when Sienna, Jake and Avy went to the Christmas fair.

A film review by the Viking Voice team

For most of the other reviewers, the favourite parts of the film involved two comedy characters: Tad and Ralph. Tad is a stereotypically spoilt and privileged social influencer who cares for little other than himself and what others think of him. He couldn’t be more different to Ralph, a hermit living in the wild, cut off from the world and all forms of social media. By chance they end up stranded together. And the fun begins.

For Albie, the best moments of the film were “whenever Ralph was on the screen” and Noah R agreed that the funniest moments were when these two were together. George, Albie and Aidan all voted for Ralph as their favourite character. Oscar and Noah R liked Tad the best. While Noah S and Josh favoured Jake since he was “truly a kind guy”.

If there was a moral to the story it might be that “you don’t need money to be happy” (Noah S) and that real identity is found in community and not online. George and Aidan found some practical advice in the storyline suggesting that the film was a warning not to marry the wrong person and not to settle for “someone who doesn't care about you as much as you care about them”.

A film review by the Viking Voice team

At the end of the day, did our Viking Voice team recommend the film to you? Some do, saying, “Yes, if you want to watch a fun Christmas film” and that it does pretty much what it says on the label. However, not everyone recommends the film, for example Noah S, who thinks it was “generic and quite boring”.

George was not far behind in his opinion considering it “a waste of 90 minutes”. Josh’s considered opinion is that the film was “poorly executed with limited finesse” while Will thought the film was “basic and poorly executed.” Hmm, so not for everyone.

But if you are looking for a run of the mill Christmas romantic comedy that would appeal to all ages to get you into the Christmas mood, then Falling for Christmas might be just the thing.

However, if you’re not convinced by our review and you want to watch a good Christmas movie, our team recommends instead trying The Nightmare before Christmas or The Polar Express (Noah S), any of the Home Alone films (George and Aidan), Let it Snow (Albie), Daddy’s Home (Oscar), Elf (Oscar and Josh) or Arthur Christmas (Will).