The Royal Nanny

The Royal Nanny is an easy to watch Christmas movie from the 2022 holiday batch. The acting is solid and the storyline has a different twist, departing from the usual commoner-among-royalty theme, mixing in a bit of British secret service with some who-done-it (in lieu of the standard "misunderstanding" trope) as well as some Mary Poppins and a lot of British Royal mystique. It doesn't follow the usual Royal cookie-cutter formula, making for a unique story that is complicated only by the G rating. It would be interesting to see the caper fully developed outside of Hallmark. The Royal Nanny is definitely worthy of 90 minutes of attention.

I do like it when Hallmark goes to England, and this was no exception. Rachel Skarsten is good, as usual, and very striking looking with her hair up. Her English accent was a little distracting, but that was a me problem as she has the accent credentials once playing Elizabeth Tudor in the popular series Reign. But I digress.

This had elements of a typical Nannyfish out of water taking care of precocious Royal Children and falling for the Prince. But this usual template is rescued from dreary business-as-usual by the fact that this was also part MI5 spy story. Agent Rachel helps uncover a plot against the Royal Family and the military intelligence department sends her to protect the family disguised as the new nanny. She is partnered by Tousaint Meghie as Wallace, the new chauffeur. She goes through a whirlwind training by the Nanny Whisperer, Greta Scacchi, who has aged gracefully and settled into character parts very comfortably, thank you very much. Her specialty is weaponizing the ever-present Nanny umbrella. Once she is installed, highjinks ensue with the kids trying to prank her. She is not MI5 for nothing however, and their amateur efforts are nipped in the bud quite resoundingly with the bucket of spaghetti landing on their co-conspirator, Uncle Colin (the love interest). She wins the kids over by not ratting them out to their mother, the Princess, and even indulging in a prank of her own. Of course, we have the obligatory invitation to the Royal Ball and the jaw-dropping entrance. She wins Colin over when he sees her with her hair freed from her tight bun and in a feminine red ball dress. But also by jumping in to help with his charity coincidentally benefitting her old orphanage. The enemies attack as they are exiting and Rachel saves the kids with some ninja umbrella action, but Colin gets kidnapped.

The romance was lame with little chemistry between the two lovebirds and really had no future despite the kiss at the end. The spy part was adequate. I suspected one character, who turned out to be guilty of something, but not of the main threat of harming the children. When Colin gets kidnapped, Rachel's boss tries to fire her but the princess stands up for her and throws the male spooks out on their ear. Yay! The main bad guy and the motive will be no surprise to anyone with even a passing interest in British mystery and international intrigue stories, but that was totally OK.

I always cringe when my wife puts on a Hallmark Christmas movie that involves English royalty or a prince or a princess or a countess or a lord or a king or a queen - etc.

There hasn't been a good one since 2014's "A Royal Christmas" with Lacey Chabert and Jane Seymour.

Until now. This was surprisingly different and quite entertaining. Rachel Skarsten is perfect as the nanny of Royalty children - who isn't really a nanny at all. There's a nice blend of mystery, humor, and yuletide cheer here that keeps your attention throughout. The supporting cast is very good, too, particularly Katie Sheridan as the children's princess mother. Plus, there's the added feature of an unrecognizable Greta Scacchi as the owner of a nanny service company. She is delightful in a role that is sort of a nice tribute to the late Angela Lansbury.

Filmed partly in Belgium, the production values and sets are nice to look at, but it's really the little surprises in the story and the fine performances of the entire cast that makes this worthwhile. Well done.

We enjoyed the characters and the actors and actresses very much. The story, although a little off, followed along naturally in a typical pleasant Hallmark fashion. It was a cozy evening, easy to watch movie. The children actors were not obnoxious and actually knew their lines. The Royal movies often go astray with an abundance of awful uniforms, mean old fathers or grandmothers, protocol, and newspaper headline catastrophes. We were glad the bypassed the, oh you screwed up - breakup routine in favor of an actual story. We'd like to see more stories without the misconstruance by one or both primary actors.

This movie is as much a cloak and dagger story as a Christmas Romance, perhaps even more so. The suspense of a plot against the royal family runs throughout the movie with the climax being focused entirely on that. There are clues and red herrings sprinkled into the story.

I was surprised to see Rachel Skarsten as the lead, Claire, because I almost didn't recognize her. I was totally impressed with her in Marry Me at Christmas and her performance here shows a different side of her, although both characters have a reserved personality. Skarsten establishes a good working relationship with all the major actors playing characters in the royal family including Dan Jeannotte as Prince Colin.

Given that to all appearance, this Royal story is set in a country we know to be real, it was distracting to me trying to keep putting down that nagging demand for some reality check especially regarding romance between an orphan and a Prince. I kept thinking "No way", but any viewer already knows that such expectations don't apply in this kind of movie. Most Royal stories are set in a way that the prince or princess is not from a real country.

In the beginning there are several practical jokes attempted both against Claire and even by Claire which help create a light heartedness in the atmosphere. (I am irritated once again by network previews showing a little too much, not in terms of spoiling the plot, but taking the impact out of at least one of the funnier scenes.) Getting deeper into the movie, the tone moves more to the sentimental as Claire bonds with the family, especially the children. I already mentioned the cloak and dagger suspense.