A Castle for Christmas

A Castle for Christmas

To escape a scandal, a bestselling author journeys to Scotland, where she falls in love with a castle -- and faces off with the grumpy duke who owns it.

  • Released: 2021-11-26
  • Runtime: 98 minutes
  • Genre: Comedy, Family, Romance
  • Stars: Brooke Shields, Cary Elwes, Vanessa Grasse, Suanne Braun, Lee Ross, Mark Fleischmann, Andi Osho, Drew Barrymore, Eilidh Loan, Stephen Oswald, Tina Gray, Desiree Burch, Anthony Strachan, John Stahl, Timothy Barrow
  • Director: Mary Lambert
 Comments
  • Racingphan2 - 22 December 2023
    Two old people walk into a castle.
    Okay, stop me if you've heard this one before. A notororious show killer and the star of Men in Tights end up together in one movie.

    Brooke Shields, who has joined the cast of many series, only to immediately see them cancelled, (Remember Army Wives among others?) joins the artist best known for wearing green tights.

    Okay, the scenery is gorgeous, the townspeople are quirky and inviting, and the Scottish Whiskey looks amazing. Brook Shields looks ancient, and Cary Elwes had to be close to seventy.

    But Netflix had a couple of million to dump into their bank accounts, so here we are.

    Thanks for wasting my time. I'm out.
  • wesleythegnome - 22 December 2022
    The vibes are off
    I love Brooke Shields and Cary Elwes, and I also love cheesy Christmas movies, so I was ready to love this movie.

    I did not love it. Brooke Shields' choices for her character are baffling. She's always making an expression that only seems tangentially related to the scene, like I found her genuinely confusing to watch. She always looks somewhat nervous, agitated, or like she has to pee really bad.

    There's zero chemistry between the leads. The scene where they're eating each other's breath and Brooke sniffs Cary's ear, I almost died of second hand embarrassment.

    The plot is supposed to be adversaries who fall in love, but it isn't developed at all. Someone in the pub tells her the duke isn't so bad, and even though she thought he was awful moments before, now she likes him all of a sudden.

    After that, they spend the whole movie kind of bickering and kind of flirting. Towards the end she's delighted by snow falling outside, and he's rude about it for no reason. I think Cary's character was supposed to come off as prickly but well-meaning, but I thought he was just unpleasant.

    The castle has land attached, and tenants on that land. For some reason, those people are unable to pay off their mortgage by themselves, so they need saving. We see this same handful of villagers over and over, and it became really grating for me. They all become Brooke's best friends, because they keep her company and give her knitted gifts. Other than that, their characters were oddly developed.

    There's the "bury your gays" gay man who is gay exclusively off-screen, because his husband is dead. He supposedly hasn't spoken since his husband passed away, but then there's a scene in the pub where he's just chatting with the person next to him?? He also sings. The predictable scene at the end where he finally speaks again had me rolling my eyes, because him overcoming his disability is a feelgood moment for the able characters, but especially because he speaks throughout the movie.

    There's the perky baker, who is 100/10 perky in every scene she's in. She was making me nervous. Her plotline is that her business kicks off thanks to baking for the pub people at the castle, instead of baking for them at the pub. Her baked goods looked awful??

    There's the pubkeeper, who is very lovely and has truly zero personality. She wants to date the kilt guy from the castle, and they date. Okay.

    Everyone loathes the kilt guy's tours, and it's never shown why. His tours seem fine? He gives a normal castle tour. So why does he send tourists running? Why do the tourists buy heaps of souvenirs when Brooke gives the tour? It's supposed to be a funny moment, but it's not based on anything. You can't have a pay-off without a set-up.

    Brooke's character is an author, but she's an amazing hairdresser too, for some reason. Because she lived near a hairdresser. What??

    There's a daughter character who is so flat, I could not remember what her face looked like every time she hung up the phone. A heartwarming reunion between mother and daughter is planned at the end of the movie, and it was totally not heartwarming. They seemed moderately happy to see each other. It also had no impact on the remainder of the story.

    Netflix tries to be self-referential by including characters from other Christmas movies. It's a cute joke, but I totally forgot those two characters and was just left feeling confused that a villainous couple was introduced and then never brought up again, until I read an explanation online. It makes an already sloppily written movie feel even sloppier.

    All in all, I felt bored and confused. It's insulting how little they tried with this.
  • lovemontana - 6 November 2022
    I Liked It :)
    Was it cheesy, yes. Isn't that required in a modern day Christmas movie? I liked the actors being a little older than the usual 20 year olds in these kind of movies. I enjoyed watching these two find love again. I love both of these actors, and they worked perfectly in this story. I'm assuming the negative reviews were because of their age and not because of the story. It's worth watching in my opinion, The dog is adorable and the knitting club is a beautiful story of friendship. Don't listen to the cynics :) watch it and enjoy. I would love to travel to Scotland at Christmas and experience the beauty it has to offer!
  • kellyq12 - 5 January 2022
    Cute enough
    It's what you would expect from a Christmas movie starring the Blue Lagoon and the Prince Bride Westley. It's a little fun, it's a little charming, and it's plenty sweet. But no, it's not breaking any ground. The dialogue and storytelling are just adequate. Slightly better quality than your typical Hallmark TV movie.