User reviews

Not bad for a tv Christmas movie. A little grittier than most and though it's not something to watch over and over, it kept me watching to see what would happen to these characters. As others have commented, not everyone is like able, but that's how it is in a family. I prefer a more realistic story than overly nice (unreal) Christmas stories.

I did notice the video game sound the kid was playing was '80's Atari Pac-Man lol

I seemed to spend most of it shouting at Gemma Whelan (who I love & why I watched this) to get dressed! She spends a lot in time in a tiny shortie nightie, wellies & thick coat, at one time complaining that the (non existent) frost had got her sprouts! If it was that cold - and cold enough for her husband to wear a woolly hat in bed - she'd be wearing nice warm pyjamas. Don't know why that bugged me, but it did!

I felt that some parts of the story were unresolved - something would happen either without explaining why or how, or it wouldn't be discussed again. And then everything suddenly became all right again.

Based on some other reviews I guess it might have been edited for TV.

Interesting if you want a glimpse into 3 days in the lives of a dysfunctional family, but not if you want a "traditional" nice & tidy Hallmark-type Christmas movie.

The cast was virtually flawless...The plot? Hard to find one. Who were the main characters? What was the story? When you get to the end of the movie you're left thinking, "So what?"

For a Christmas movie with a well used storyline...that being just as the title says - Surviving Christmas with the Relatives - it is quite enjoyable. Not as silly or madcap as most...it is a good little timewaster to watch with the family after Christmas day winds down.

If you're British with a dysfunctional family, or, enjoy British humour, it's brilliant. If not, c'est la vie.

Some of the actors were good. But it was like different characters playing individual roles that never quite became an ensemble. There were so many individual plots that nothing was interesting. Truly nothing was interesting about this film.

A Countryside Christmas/Surviving Christmas With The Relatives (2018) -

"Mummy! The pope mobile is here!"

The actors in this film were all very good and it was nice to see Gemma Whelan in a feminine role for a change and I mean no disrespect by that, it's just that I've only really seen her as Theon's sister in 'Game Of Thrones' (201-19) and a rough and tough lesbian in 'Queers' (2017), so it was a nice change and she made a good mum character.

I also really liked Julian Ovenden's Dad character of Dan, again I had only really come across him recently in his gay role in 'Bridgerton' (2020-). He was a pleasant father figure here and his performance in general was good.

I even enjoyed Ronni Ancona's part too. I have tended to find that she's quite extreme, but actually she was quite bearable in this one as Vicky. The character was nicely balanced.

They all faced a lot of issues that could have easily been resolved or avoided, but it would have been a very boring film without it.

And I must confess that it did start to drag towards the end where there was no suggestion that it was going to go anywhere and it didn't really, but it was still enjoyable, because it felt real for the most part, like a Christmas that I could recognise from a British home, because it wasn't all cookie baking and tree decorating and snowmen building contests, like the offerings from Hallmark and so on.

And that was the main gist of the film, a standard holiday with the kids at home, interrupted by the visiting relatives and no matter how much prep had been done, there still hadn't been enough time to do everything necessary. I start my next year's Christmas shopping as soon as I'm done each December, but I never seem to get everything else sorted in time, so I recognised the pressure.

It did smack of a typical Richard Curtis type of film in a lot of ways, because it was about a family that didn't really have any money troubles, but they thought that they were. That was no council flat or bedsit they were living in. They were also much more of a film family than a typical British dynamic in most realities.

It had some fairly good production values and nobody in the cast gave a duff performance, but there was room for improvement. It still felt sweet in some ways and had a great feeling of the season too.

721.56/1000.

Comedic timing missing by the biggest Santa bag. Good actors but absolutely horrible as an ensemble. Too bored to write more.

Pointless and meaningless movie. Time wasting and very difficult to watch it until the end. If you manage to do so though, you end up looking at the rest of your family with a weird expression like: "what have we watched now"?

The first few minutes says it all. Absolute tosh from the start and only gets worse. Don't waste your time!

Why did they have to show a guy snorting coke. It added nothing to the story. Ols storyline. I only watched for Joely Richardson .

A disappointment. The storyline had potential but unfortunately fell short.

The writing is just terrible. Every single person is literally awful. Even the children, who go around collecting for charity, only to keep the money.

If you write yourself, this writer is a tosser.

2 stars for casting a number of Miranda alum.

This is the most boring film I've ever had to endure. Do not waste your time. I would've turned it off had it not been for my stubborn husband saying he wanted to watch a Christmas movie. Again, please do not waste your time!

This is boring and has one swear word so far.... So not so family friendly .

I don't usually get worked up over stuff, but this is pretty bad. In the beginning of the movie the despicable character, Trent, talks about fancy cars while he's drinking Scotch and smoking cigars with his brother-in-law. You get the idea that he's a real and then he says, "I'm a Jew." In the rest of the movie you find out he's a rich drunk who can't hold down a job. He takes Viagra one night and when he gets rebuffed by his wife he finds a cousin and hits on her. Despicable. The movie should be banned.

Be prepared for the fact that the children in this film are played by child actors. Highlights include Sally Philips hitting a man and Ronni Ancona hoovering.

I thought it was much better then Most people are saying. Great Holiday fun. Good story, good acting, what else do you want from an Xmas movie!

I give this movie 10 stars because it's nice to watch a movie where Christmas is celebrated in a home that has more problems than mine!

I wasn't sure when the movie first started, since the first word in the movie is cursing, but once I saw the living conditions, I was on board!

Besides the problems of living in a fixer-upper, I appreciate the family dynamics of siblings with different families who don't necessarily get along, but they endure each other and make the best of what they've got.

Lots of funny humor when it comes to the awkwardness of family situations, and the highs and lows of family gatherings, but not what I would consider to be a family movie; just because there are kids in it doesn't mean it's for kids.

I would recommend this movie for adults who are happy to be spending Christmas away from relatives, because with a family like this it's more than enough!

Now that IMDb requires 600 characters for a movie review, the real shame is that all the one-sentence bad reviews of this movie don't get removed!