Last Christmas

The last successful entry in the category of classic British Christmas movie has to be Love Actually, and in common with that film and many other classics of the genre is a mixture of light and shade. This is the sort of thing that many find off-putting: because it’s hard to believe that people who look like Emelia Clarke can be unhappy with their lives, although of course this is nonsense. Her quirkiness has led to some ludicrous comparisons with Fleabag, but the trick to this film is to see it as a bit of Christmas fun. It’s based on the music of Wham! and George Michael, and was developed with the performer’s blessing.

There are also some similarities with the Proverbially Great Christmas film It’s A Wonderful Life. It’s about a young George Michael-loving woman who doesn’t have her life together a year after being very unwell. Kate (Clarke) has taken a job at a Christmas shop in Covent Garden—a shop that functions all year round  because its manager (Michelle Yeoh) really loves Christmas for all its tacky decorative accoutrements—even her name is Santa: go figure. Kate is really Katerina—her family left Yugoslavia in the 90s, because of the war, but she steadfastly anglicises her name. Her sister is estranged and her mother is Emma Thompson with a European accent, which is not as funny as it’s meant to be, but there’s a point to it… Kate avoids the family until she has alienated all of her friends in a montage of ridiculous accidents involving the destruction of fine crafts and electrocution of fish.

Then Kate meets Tom (Henry Golding), who instantly cuts a charming but elusive dash; he is cool, understanding, interested, and weird. Kate’s comedy clumsiness sky-rockets before she goes back to her mother and begins to get her life together. And her boss takes pity on her as she too finds love, again with a mysterious man who is into pickled vegetables.

This broad comedy and application of some wild European stereotypes seems like a mis-step but suddenly the subject of the film turns briefly to immigration and the Brexit debate. There’s some angry words from a racist on a bus. But Kate has warmed to her family and its traditions and she makes the Europeans on the bus feel welcome in London. And London is the gleaming, clean, mostly-friendly backdrop to the film. At the start of the film when you’re still adjusting to the quirkiness, and the fact that it’s the middle of November, everything seems a little too perfect, but the makers of the film have wisely chosen some excellent locations. Not just the Covent Garden Piazza, but a community run garden in the middle of town, and some of the many charming streets that the city has in abundance. And although I have never seen it snow like it snows on Emilia Clarke towards the end, by then I am on board with the film.

On board despite the plot not really coming together properly; on board not necessarily because of the music, which is nicely placed but not as central to the story as you might think; on board not necessarily because Emilia Clarke is funny and pretty; on board not because Henry Golding’s Tom is such an enigmatic figure whose intensity is knowingly weird to begin with before it becomes of central interest. Because this is a romantic comedy… isn’t it? Well, people will have to judge it for themselves, but it becomes a film very much about drawing together with people you love and with providing what charity you can—and accepting other people, especially from continental Europe. There’s a big doff of the cap to the St Martin’s Lane charity for the homeless; and it’s the homeless who are genuine people who are simply not on the economic ladder, which is fair enough for the purposes of this story. And like the Paddington films the city of London is portrayed as an open, joyful and multi-cultural city where we face problems together. It’s got to be said that many people who come to this country to live change their accent, but maybe older people tend to keep a national accent. Whatever the truth, Emma Thompson’s choice to do a ‘comedy’ turn with an accent sticks out until you realise that there’s a point to it. The character that Emilia Clarke plays might suffer from being like she is in order to motor the plot, but she manages to sell it. And Henry Golding is pretty good as a sort of Proto-Perfect Man who maybe is some sort of tour-guide as he points out little known parts of Covent Garden and beyond. It’s co-written by Emma Thompson, and directed by rom-com legend Paul Feig, and it has an excellent soundtrack. It’s not going to come close to A Christmas Carol and Muppet Christmas Carol but it is not a “bad” film. It’s joyful in its way but there are a lot of better Christmas films to see first…