Brooke Shields, Cary Elwes, Christmas. Do I even need to review this one? You know from the first five words whether or not you want to see this film. And if you want to see it, will it disappoint? Probably not. It’s a bad film and all, but if you’re familiar with Brooke Shields, you knew that already.
Just in case you’re oblivious to 1980s pop culture, Brooke Shields and Cary Elwes were both hits at the time – Brooke during Reagan’s first term, Elwes during Reagan’s second. And then they disappeared, slowly, and in front of our very eyes, on screen. In the decades that followed, neither has been inactive and yet, neither has had a role an ounce as memorable as Shields in The Blue Lagoon (1980) or Elwes in The Princess Bride (1987). The producers of A Castle for Christmas cannot have been unaware of this fact, and were –perhaps- catering to a crowd that last made a pop culture stand while Michael Keaton was still Batman. That’s a long, long time ago.
Sophie Brown (Shields) is a romance novelist who killed off her hero in the last book to the thunderous “boos” of her patrons. While I was hoping for a remake of Misery at this point … no such luck. The tragedy of her fictional hero reflected a personal tragedy; Sophie was pissed about a bad breakup with her last significant other and took it out on her alter-ego. Odd choice there. Compounding the issue, Sophie gets on the Drew Barrymore show to explain herself and instead yells at the audience. Seeing erstwhile icons of youth Barrymore and Shields both heavily over-makeup-ed made me very sad, indeed.
So what do you do when you’re a famous novelist but your audience now dislikes you and you don’t have a partner and it’s the holidays? Why, go to Scotland and buy a castle, of course. A Castle for Christmas. Based on some foolishness about her father once being the Duke’s whipping boy or whatever, Sophie decides “Why not buy this castle?” Sure, makes total sense. The current Duke Myles (Elwes) is something of a broken man living alone in a castle he can no longer afford and doing landscaping chores around the community just to make ends not meet.
Naturally, the two don’t get along much, especially having such adversarial economic roles at the present. Ah, but Sophie and Myles are both single, attractive fiftysomethings and both 
have tragic love stories in their past – For Myles, the Duchess Buttercup left him for a Prince. Sophie’s tale is a little more sordid, something about incest while coming of age on a deserted island. Can these two learn to tolerate one another long enough to share the castle?
I cannot say there’s a lot that impressed me about A Castle for Christmas. It is pretty much what you expect along with a handful of “why did they do that?” moments. I will give the film credit for a few things, however: 1) Cary Elwes can definitely handle a Scottish accent; it’s tougher than it looks and has buried more than one decent actor before him. 2) With two random black characters, a gay man, a few fogies, some PTSD, and two heroes in their 50s, the film practically reeks of a diversity rarely seen in a film set in Scotland. 3) There was a small, yet detectable, amount of humor available in this standard Noel-a-thon. Is all of that enough for me to recommend A Castle for Christmas? Oh, Hell no. But it did make me pay attention –more or less- while it was on.
Middle-agers with lives oh so sad
Find the holidays may not be so bad
A Noel Scottish fling
Can mean but one thing:
A Yule dominated by plaid
Not Rated, 98 Minutes
Director: Mary Lambert
Writer: Kim Beyer-Johnson, Ally Carter, Neal H. Dobrofsky, Tippi Dobrofsky
Genre: Have yourself a clichéd little Christmas
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Christmas cookies
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Grinches
