A Royal Christmas Holiday

It seems like every rom/com network has to have at least one royal story at Christmas. This one combines an ambitious reporter looking for an exclusive interview. This one is a bit unusual in that the reporter is honest. The obvious disaster occurs completely by accident, at least from the reporter's side. To add to the drama, it happens after a strong segment emphasizing values and honesty.

There is a petty rival but she only has a small part.

Reality. What is that? The prince is quickly smitten and within a day of knowing her is already falling in love. Katie is quickly smitten too.

But then there is the predictable conflict. One part of it is obvious, but a second part of it is not so obvious beforehand, although there is at least one early reference that foreshadows it. Either way, the conflict is a real muddle, Actually the issue behind it is overblown. What the prince did is common and the fact that he brings it up first only looks better on him.

The closing cleanup is again obviously predictable, but seemed to me a bit clumsy.

The acting is inconsistent. Likewise the script. I usually find it difficult to find chemistry between leads in a royal movie because princes are by nature reserved.

From the same people who made A Royal Christmas On Ice comes a new story with the same Prince? I'm not sure if this is supposed to be a sequel to the other one or what but it's got John Stoddard as Prince Jonathan (formerly Prince John in ARCOI) and William Baldwin (I guess not a sequel as in the first he was Daryl and in this he's Jarrod) and another lackluster script.

A lot of cringe moments, second hand embarrassment, which is a shame because like so many it had potential.

Like why make the same actor once again a prince with the same name? It's just confusing if you've seen both. Was this supposed to be a reboot with some changes?

Anyway, JS and WB do passable jobs with the script given. But too much cringe over all to recommend.

I can't say I understand the folks (apologies) that saw chemistry between these two. They both felt flat in this highly predictable show. It felt like they were both reciting their lines, and neither is more than above-average in looks. Often, in these films, supporting actors rescue an otherwise tepid show, but, alas, such is not the case here.

Well into the story I still couldn't decide, from the narrative, if she was leading him along in order to get a killer interview. But the biggest mystery was why his shields weren't up in this situation. As a royal prince he must have developed a bit of a hard shell, and he appears to be a naive 30-yr old here.

No chemistry. No tension. Blah.

Overall I love the feel-good story so I give it 10 for that as I'd watch it again. However the cultural issues are slightly annoying. Firstly, as someone who is of mixed heritage, whilst I love that there's a Latino flavour to this movie, this is an English-speaking movie so should be English subtitles on the Spanish dialogue, otherwise it just isn't inclusive and is therefore inverted racism. Furthermore subtitles help people trying to learn additional languages and cultures. Secondly, Americans doing royal movies is always unrealistic - eg no bodyguards and they'd never have big passionate in public, especially so early in an unannounced relationship. I see from a YouTube interview that Jonathan Stoddard feels he's been respectful to British royalty by not making his character an idiot, but American-made Royal movies are something I generally avoid because they a such an unrealistic representation of monarchy and cause arrogance in Americans thinking they know it all and can voice an opinion, as seen when Princess Kate took an unexpected break from duties before announcing her cancer. On the upside, seeing the Prince enjoy the everyday things, interacting with the public and supporting them through tragedies, is very much like the British monarchy - these sad scenes are what make this Royal Movie better than the usual fare.

Fred Olen Ray, who knows a successful Christmas formula and sticks with it, wrote and produced his best, of the ones I've seen. With low budget movies, the casting, setting and writing are especially important, and the two leads (who also worked together in 2022 for "Prince and Pauper Christmas") have wonderful chemistry. It was nice to see my hometown East Aurora on display again, and it was a treat to see Dennis DiPaolo play the role of the server Dennis in his family's own restaurant in Buffalo, but at about the halfway mark, I forgot about the local aspects of the movie and began to root for the two leads to fall in love (which was virtually assured), and it was the way in which the relationship developed that made it so easy to watch without taking a break. I also noticed that Don The Shopkeeper (filmed at Vidler's 5 & 10 in East Aurora) has been in previous Ray movies. I hope that the movie company decides to come back to East Aurora for another movie - Christmas or any time. A very pleasant movie to watch and I hope its short run on the Great American Family network continues on a more accessible platform, such as Netflix or Amazon Prime.