Katie and Jessica are best friends, and their life is on the ice... Jessica is an ice skater, Katie used to skate as well and the two of them are about to get an ice rink of their own to start their own business, training a new generation of skaters close to their home, in New Jersey. Katie is looking forward to it, to finally living in a proper place, rather than being on tour all the time, having a proper Christmas. In fact, they only have one more show before this year's tour is over, a performance at San Senova.
San Senova is a small country, presumably in Europe, and the whole country seems to revolve around the holidays. According to legend, San Senova was founded on Christmas day, centuries ago, and the country still relies heavily on tourism, specially around this time of year. It's while she's at the Christmas market that Katie stumbles upon Alex, a serious looking guy, hiding at the back of a type of temporary stage, practicing a demonstration of Christmas spirit he certainly doesn't seem to experience in his heart
Little does she now, Alex is actually king Alexander, the young monarch of San Senova, a man who's been struggling with celebrating Christmas for the past few years, whom the press has mercilessly nicknamed "the Grinch king". The king desperately wants to turn things around and improve his image, but nothing is going according to plan. The truth is he's just not that excited about the holidays since his wife passed away, and he doubts he will ever be as good a king as his father, whom the people loved as the "Christmas King", for many years. Even his relationship with his daughter has suffered, and although he clearly loves the little girl with all his heart, he's struggling to demonstrate there, and struggling to balance his official commitments with spending time together with her.
It is the princess, Cristina, who comes up with an idea to improve her father's image. Her grandfather has wanted for a long time to put up a Christmas show to celebrate the foundation of the country, but just never got around to it prior to passing away. Cristina wants to organize a pageant, with an ice skiing presentation, re-enacting the foundation of San Senova for all the people of the capital. She hopes a pageant will make everyone see that her dad is not a Grinch King at all. In her eyes, he's the best dad ever. It is for Cristina's sake that Alexander agrees to talk to the world renowned skaters that are in the country for the last performance in their tour. Who just happen to be Katie and Jessica.
After some trepidation, the girls agree to participate, even though it is a tall order, putting together a pageant in just 13 days. The payment is just the money they need for their ice rink, and both of them take a liking to the little princess, who seems to love skating as much as the two women do.
I loved the ice skating setting of the film... It's amazing that there are so many of these Christmas Royal movies and not one of them had thought to use ice skating yet (Apart of course from that wonderful ice skating scene in The Bishop's wife). The worldbuilding aspect of the movie was pretty cool too, and it's nice that for once there's a very good reason for the country to be so involved in the holidays: It was actually founded on Christmas!
The plot is pretty standard. A sad king needs to find his way back to love and family, and a foreign girl who's common by birth and unique in every other way teaches him the true meaning of Christmas. Katie loves Christmas, and it isn't long before she stir things up and brings some of it back to the palace, getting the king to go buy a Christmas tree and bake cookies together with herself and the princess.
It's cool also that the movie avoided some of the clichés of the genre, like having a better-match for the king appear at some point, a woman of noble birth and impeccable manners who's everyone's first pick for the next queen. The tabloids even hint at the monarch's involvement with Katie at some point, but Katie's reaction is much more relax than one would have anticipated. He is single, she is single, there is no scandal and nothing particularly improper about the situation. The king is worried, not because of her birth but because of his daughter, getting attached to someone who might fly away at any moment. Actually they are both worried about that themselves... They both lost people before, and they worry about getting attached to someone and losing that person.
If I have any criticism, is that some of the internal logic of the movie is off at times... Like when they go pick a tree and select an enormous one, definitely NOT the same tree they carry to the car later... And the way the king and princess just stand on the ice while the other skaters circle around them at some point during the big performance... But these are little things, and they don't matter very much.
I also hoped the ending was a little different, but I'm not gonna give that up here because it's a big spoiler. Let's just say I would prefer things to be simpler, without so many comings and goings on airplanes to San Senova and back...
Fan of Christmas movies that I am, I had seen many of the movies in this marathon before, and now I am just rewatching them for the blog (and because there is no such thing as too many Christmas movies, of course!). This one, however, I had never seen before. I quite enjoyed it. The palace, in particular, was undeniably beautiful...
Is Die Hard a Christmas movie?
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