The rotten spoiled daughter of a hotel magnate has a terrible fall skiing four days before Christmas and can’t remember who she is. The handsome owner of an inn, in financial difficulty, comes to her rescue.
Posted at 11:30 a.m.
The Christmas movie season is officially launched on the platforms and it’s Netflix that opens the ball with a romantic comedy as we like them, in the holiday season. Everything is there: the songs and the splendid Christmas decorations, the dreamy landscapes and the sympathetic characters who overcome difficulties and fall in love. The recipe is followed to the letter, with enough twists and humor to sustain interest.
The return of Lindsay Lohan in the lead role of a feature film, the first for fifteen years, is an undeniable asset. A big star in the early 2000s, she notably shone in freaky friday (A crazy, crazy, crazy Friday) and Mean Girls (Bad teens), but his star faded following his run-ins with the law and his stays in rehab centers. This first of three films that she has committed to making with Netflix shows her firm desire to regain control of her career.
She bends to the game in the role of the extremely wealthy Sierra Belmont, whose slightest whim is granted without her lifting a finger. Her character is cartoonish at first glance, as is that of her fiancé (George Young), an influencer obsessed with her image on social media. After they are separated following accidents at the top of a snowy precipice, their adventures are more ridiculous than each other.
The beautiful heiress, stricken with amnesia, is taken in by the attractive owner of an inn threatened with closing (Chord Overstreet) and his young daughter. Without her chic clothes, which would have betrayed her origin, she learns to live like everyone else (making a bed has never seemed to represent such a big challenge…).
Janeen Damian, who has written the screenplays for several romantic Christmas comedies, is in her first experience as a director. She knows all the codes and uses them thoroughly. It is of course necessary to abandon all critical sense. But for fans of the genre, this film is like a decadent dessert. It is too rich, but it does good and warms the heart.
On Netflix
Romantic comedy
Falling for Christmas (V.F.: Christmas falls on time)
Janeen Damian
Starring Lindsay Lohan, Chord Overstreet, George Young
1:33 a.m.