Il magico Natale scozzese

A beautiful location in Scotland, but it can't make up for another garbage script from Reel One Entertainment. Their motto is "Quantity over Quality", they just keep churning them out from January to December. A good movie starts with a good script, but that's not a priority for Reel One.

If their writers want to learn something, 2021's movie "A Castle for Christmas" starring Brooke Shields and Cary Elwes worked because the script was good, along with the acting. It was funny and had some dramatic moments. Hallmark's 2023 "A Merry Scottish Christmas" didn't work as well, but it's still better than this Reel One disaster.

There were some good actors like Lewis Howden, among the leads Watters was much better than Winternitz.

I wanted to love this film, I really did, but the acting is just so fake. All of the characters come across as "played", not authentic at all. Every smile, every look, every blink feels planned. If you asked some AI robots to play out a script, it would probably approach the acting in this film.

As I gathered my thoughts on this film, I realized why I felt let down; because it could have been great! I think the concept wasn't inherently bad. As a European, I've seen many films about real and fake European countries that adopt or portray various European cultures and they usually lack an accurate portayal of monarchies, laws, culture, etc. In equal measure. In fact, I think this film's portrayal of Scottish culture is actually not so terrible.

The major letdown in its portrayal of Scotland is the idea that modern rural villages can be owned entirely by a powerful laird who lives in a grand castle and orders the villagers around. It felt pretentious. I think they could've found ways around this. Instead, they relied on an antiquated part of Scottish history which only turns viewers off altogether.

Besides this mistake, much of the culture portrayed is actually done fairly well. The male lead's accent is heavy but not uncommon in certain parts of Scotland and executed quite well. The tartan elements and other cultural references are also fairly accurate.

To summarize, this film is a letdown because its makers let low budget restrictions affect the execution of a concept that had potential. They did not hire actors of adequate quality to carry the film either. As evidenced by other films, inexperienced actors don't have to be bad. Even on a low budget, I think they could've found better actors but simply didn't search hard enough. The cultural references are actually decent, although not all of these traditions are widespread in the more populated parts of the country, but the portrayal of a modern laird poisons the script.

This movie is an example of writers taking the checklist of all the Christmas movie themes and tropes and marking them off one by one. Emma wants a promotion which is dangled in front of her. There is a contest, in this case between villages for decorating. There is Emma's romantic opposite, Alex, who has both the demanding father and a daughter who connects with Emma. Emma and Alex have a rough first meeting. Far too quickly those around them start telling Emma and Alex separately that the other looks at them in a special way. There is a gag where the two drink hot chocolate that leaves the whipped cream on their faces. Emma leaves a boyfriend back in New York who for once doesn't dump her at the start. The fact that her home is across the ocean is an obstacle to the new potential romance. There is a ball. Both the contest and the ball require Emma and Alex to work together. Emma's boyfriend shows up unexpectedly creating a problem even beyond the developing romance with Alex.

To be fair, there are a few old standards missing. No snowball fight. Or snowman contest. The leads don't bake cookies together.

Sometimes I say the thing that's true about this movie. There are no great highs or lows or surprises. The ending is quite predictable.

The acting isn't exactly bad, but it's not good, especially a couple of characters. Jill Winternitz isn't bad but has little spark and isn't totally natural at times. She has only a little quiet chemistry with Dominic Watters. The character of the laird is inconsistent.

This movie is probably ok for either diehards who love the same old stuff, or for those who are relatively new to the genre. I am suspicious of all the 1 and 2 star reviews, 8 out of 18 total. At least those who criticized the cultural accuracy said something beside that it was awful, and some of those criticisms might have some merit. While I think the movie was derivative and not well acted, I think horrible or awful is a little too far.

Christmas In Scotland (2023) -

This was a film that tried to show the difference between the cultures on the opposite sides of the pond, but ultimately it just made the Scottish people look stupid and backwards and it didn't do much for the Americans either.

I think it's rare that the U. S. companies making a Christmas film in the U. K. do them very well and this one was more proof of that theory. It's like they don't know how to direct Brits and don't even think about utilising someone that knows what life is actually like over here or how we really behave. In some ways it feels as if the American style of filming rubs the wrong way against our British way.

The story had a lot of similarities to a number of mixed nationality seasonal films, but especially 'A Yorkshire Christmas/A Very British Christmas' (2019), however the leading actor, Mark Killeen was at least hot in that one and the leading lady had an appeal and heart.

In fact the acting in this film was generally terrible.

Jill Winternitz seemed pretty ineffectual as the lead Emma and the Scottish Dominic Watters was not appealing in his role of Alex. His grumpy character made it a struggle to believe that he would ever mellow or change, even for love.

Also, Emma's Dad, Mike (Toby Rolt) was incredibly extreme! I don't know anybody that talks like that, except when they're taking the mickey out of William Shatner. And the first boyfriend Brad (Adam Bond) was more than a bit creepy. He must have paid a lot for the photos on his IMDB page, that's all I can say.

Also, my Sister is actually a Laird, because she bought a square foot of land in Scotland, so I'm not sure that being a Laird actually has as much power anymore, as it was shown here.

I did give up on this film in the end, because I just couldn't put myself through another one that was going to annoy me. I was riled up very early on and I don't need to do that to myself.

Unscored as Unfinished.

I watched the whole movie, and found it partly good and partly bad. Of the acting, only one actor was truly terrible. A couple were not great, but passable, and most were fully believable. The two leads were pretty good, he better than she. The story, as with most others like this, was predictable. But so what!

The film had a certain charm, and if you could overlook the over-obvious reactions of the laird to just about everything, the story was very affirming. A feel good movie.

I have a few quibbles with some of the direction and decisions, like the male lead's hair was always a mess. The young girl (the laird's granddaughter) was sweet and a good actor to boot. Anyway, overall, it was definitely better than some reviewers thought.