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The first big Christmas rom-com is here - and #1 on Netflix, despite critics hating it
Negative critical consensus is no match for overwhelming power of the holidays.
Netflix has long marketed itself as the home to brave, innovative shows like Black Mirror and Stranger Things, but it seems it's also working its way into the lucrative Terrible Christmas Film market as well. This week’s most popular movie on Netflix, Best. Christmas. Ever! is so bad that we struggled to find a critic with anything nice to say about it.
The Christmas rom-com is the kind of fare that used to be relegated to cheesy direct-to-TV, with critics being generally savage toward the predictable plot and the uninspired performances from its leads. Heather Graham and Brandy, two actors who should know better, star as former frenemies who are forced to spend Christmas together with their families. There are plenty of family-friendly hijinks and a musical number you can see coming a mile away to get through before the two bury the hatchet and learn the true meaning of the holidays.
Critics haven’t been kind to the film, with one reviewer calling it “mercifully short” (the film’s 82-minute runtime is closer to a television special than a feature film) and another going as far as calling it “Terrible, even by Holiday film standards.” Jason Biggs and Matt Cedeño phone in their performances as the long-suffering husbands while the script doesn’t give Graham and Brandy enough to play with.
Still, this hasn’t stopped viewers from streaming the film, which became the number one most-streamed movie on Netflix within a week of its release. It seems that people are eager for something light and harmless for the holidays even if critics keep warning them away from it. This is the kind of behavior that gets films like Gemini Man to the top of the streaming charts, though, so be careful with your algorithm this time of year.
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