Last Christmas Should’ve Been Left on Hallmark Grade: C
Source: IMDB
Last Christmas tells a story about a selfish store clerk elf Kate (Emilia Clarke) at your local Christmas ornament shop. Whom bounces to house to house, man to man, drink to drink, while also being an under achieving singer. One day Kate meets a charming fellow Tom (Henry Golding), whom is kind hearted as he gives Kate the time of day. Tom is turning Kate from a selfish human being, whom is also careless as well, to be more giving and understanding. The Cinematography was fine, I liked a couple shots and also thinks it captures the Christmas spirit in this film just nicely. The Score was fine, I enjoyed the George Michael inspired tracks however the film over plays the Last Christmas track way too much, to the point where it comes off annoying. The cast in this film all in all were solid. Emilia Clarke playing Kate was honestly good, her character had an arc and was developed. It's your typical Christmas story for the character Kate: She starts out selfish then becomes a better person at the end, pretty basic and simple. Henry Golding playing the love interest Tom was good as well. I think my only issue with Golding and Clarke was the fact their chemistry wasn't great, it was fine for a TV movie but not for a theatrical romance film. Supporting performances I'm only going to talk briefly. I found Michelle Yeoh's performance as the store owner to be oddly adorable. Emma Thompson's performance as Kate's mother was eh, I found her attempt at this accent to be weak at moments. Flaws to discuss with this film. The twist was honestly predictable, I think everyone saw it coming a mile away. I found the story itself to be too basic and simple, where I caught myself bored at times. It's just not that interesting of a story, as a fan of romance I found the romance to be fine but is not intriguing at all. Also the side plot dealing with Kate’s boss and her love interest was just goofy and completely random. Last Christmas is a film that would be perfectly fine on the Hallmark channel or even a Netflix original, I don't really know why this film is in theaters at all. The best compliments I can give it is it captures the holiday spirit just fine and the message was executed just fine. I think it's just too basic to fully engage and discuss, like I don't hate it nor love it, but you can compare this with any other holiday film you've seen in the past. The thing that bothers me is the fact this film is acclaimed to be inspired off the song Last Christmas, when in reality... I don’t know how that can be, when it doesn’t correlate to any of the lyrics that song was written. It's cute for a date night, but other than that... Not really worth reaching out. Overall, Last Christmas was just an ok Christmas film. I would just wait for this on DVD, bring the ting over for a cup of hot chocolate and warm blankets by the fire. -Mitch Smietana