Christmas 2020 Reviews: Day 23 - Merry Kissmas (2015)

My review in short: despite an appealing male lead, who is this film's single saving grace, Merry Kissmas is absolutely terrible and I urge you to avoid it at all costs.

If that's not enough for you, here is the longer review. First, a synopsis of the film to help you understand what you're getting into:

Brought to us by MarVista Entertainment, Merry Kissmas follows Kayla (played by Karissa Lee Staples), who is the girlfriend and agent of famed director Carlton, (David O'Donnell). Carlton is self-obsessed and doesn't appreciate Kayla or her interests, making her feel unhappy in both their romantic and professional relationships. One day, after a misunderstanding, Kayla is chased down the street and jumps into a lift with Dustin (played by Brant Daugherty). To make it look like she is busy to the person chasing after her, Kayla decides that the logical thing to do is kiss this stranger in the lift with her as the doors are closing, despite being in a relationship. Yet something about that kiss makes Kayla question everything, and she slowly becomes closer with Dustin. What about her relationship with Carlton though?

The low production quality of this film and generally terrible acting from a lot of the cast aside, what I really didn't like about this film was the cheating aspect. I hate the trope of love that started out from cheating, where the film claims it's okay because the person you're cheating with is your true love, unlike the idiot you are actually with. Cheating is never okay. Don't want to be with your partner anymore? Leave them. It is that simple.

The film attempts to lean into this by making Kayla and Carlton one of the least convincing couples I have ever seen. They have no chemistry together, are frustrated with each other all the time, and both of them cheat on their partners (according to the film, it's okay when Kayla does it because she found true love, but when Carlton does it, he's a sneaky, lying bastard). They don't even look a little bit right together. The back and forth Kayla goes through with this guy is just unbearable to watch. Staples as Kayla is fine I suppose, although it's a very weak character, with little to no backbone. She isn't someone you want to follow for an hour and a half, yet she's our protagonist. Not a great start.

Out of Kayla, Dustin and Carlton, our three main characters, I had the most negative feelings about Carlton. He really was written just to be the worst person ever, and I hate boyfriend or girlfriend characters like that, characters who are so awful that they simply must be dumped, because you can't understand why the protagonist is with them to begin with. He cheats on Kayla, and there's no punishment for him for this beyond Kayla leaving, which is just a natural result of the situation in my opinion. Even then, she's still kind to him.

In the scene where Kayla learns about his infidelity, she announces that she's going to give Carlton a piece of her mind. I was looking forward to a strong confrontation, finally, some personality from Kayla, where she would say how horrible he is and stand up for herself. That's not what happens though. Kayla's version of giving someone "a piece of my mind" is having a boring, rational conversation with them. It just felt like a very odd follow-through on her previous statement.

Carlton also has a very strong English accent, bearing in mind he is played by an American actor. O'Donnell's English accent isn't actually that bad. It's a clear, upper middle class English accent. The problem? This is what O'Donnell, playing Carlton, looks like:

David O'Donnell as Carlton

Sometimes you can just look at a person and know where they are from. In this case, I looked at O'Donnell and just knew he is American, the way I imagine people look at Benedict Cumberbatch (or just read his name) and know he's English. An overly pronounced, occasionally campy, English accent is not what you expect to come out of this man, and it's rather jarring to hear such an accent from a low-budget Tony Stark.

Now, let's discuss Brant Daugherty as Dustin. Thank goodness for Brant Daugherty as Dustin.

This man manages to be the single component of this entire production that feels sincerely sweet and attractive. Unfortunately, the film has to punish him for this whenever it can.

Firstly, they pair him up with Kayla, the most indecisive woman on the planet. She's frustrated with Carlton, and cheats on him with Dustin, then leaves the former to be with the latter. Carlton says he wants her back though, and despite being unhappy for a long time, she agrees to get back with him, leaving Dustin heartbroken. The heck.

Then there's my least favourite part of this entire film. Not only did he have stranger-danger Kayla jump him and kiss him in a lift, but an elderly lady named Mrs Billing (Doris Roberts) also forces herself on Dustin every time they're alone in the same lift in his apartment building, kissing and fondling him. It's for comedic value, but I'm sorry, this is not funny, and definitely not okay.

If the gender roles were reversed, and an elderly man was forcing himself on a young woman and kissing her when she's visibly uncomfortably and politely declining these advances, as Dustin does, people would be furious. This behaviour sadly isn't exclusive to this film, but it's very prominent here. Why is it that people think it's okay to sexually harass men, simply for being good-looking? We're supposed to be living in the age of gender equality, so let's be equal please.

Speaking of the lift, according to a side character who I don't care about, there is a prophecy or curse that states that two (apparently heterosexual only) people trapped in the lift together are destined to fall in love. There is mistletoe in the lift because it's Christmas. That's it, that's the only thing hinting at romance (or in Mrs Billing's case, predatory sexual harassment) being started up in the lift. There is absolutely nothing else that suggests a real curse exists there, and mistletoe is not that deep.

Throughout the running time, I prayed that Dustin would discover that stairs existed, and would swear to only use those instead. He never did though, and I still feel bad for that poor character.

However, even Dustin becomes unenjoyable, because he's too perfect, in that he accepts Kayla's terrible treatment towards him, believing that he's being respectful of what she wants, and never affirming what he actually wants in the situation.

He also has a friend, a beautiful black woman named Jana, who is kind to him and fully supports his catering business. Yet she's never considered to be a potential love interest for him, which makes no sense to me. She's much nicer than Kayla. Also, more romances with people of colour at Christmas time would be appreciated.

Dustin also keeps denying the idea of a relationship with Kayla because he frequently insists that he's too busy with his work and needs to focus on that. He says it far too many times, but we don't really see him do that much work.

At least he gets to adopt a cute West Highland Terrier called Barkley. The Adventures of Dustin and Barkley would have been a much more entertaining watch, even if all he did was go to the shops to buy dog food and then go home again. I would rather watch that on repeat than watch this ever again.

In terms of tone, this film is all over the place. From the characters and premise, you would assume that this would be a cosily dull film for bored housewives. Some of the jokes, and the way the characters behave sometimes is so childish though. Grown women would feel patronised by some of these lines, and children would be bored out of their minds by the plot. I have no idea who this film is for.

The quality of the overall production is very weak. The script is particularly poor. The dialogue these characters have is so unnatural and heavy in exposition, that it's embarrassing to listen to at points. So many things in the story make no sense, and are underdeveloped, if developed at all.

Dustin and Kayla both desperately want a nutcracker that they see in a shop window, but Dustin gets to it first and buys it. We knew why Kayla wanted it, because she planned to gift it to Carlton, as he was directing his production of The Nutcracker. We never find out why Dustin wanted it though.

In terms of the quality of props, I will quickly say that this nutcracker that they both want, which is supposed to be a unique kind, hand-painted by a niche eighty year old artist, is clearly a standard mass-produced nutcracker. It would be harder for me to find a nutcracker that didn't look like this than to find another one that does. Also, the sign outside of the theatre for Carlton's show is very amateurish, which for such a showy character, I don't think he would stand for.

Back to the script, the woman who owns the shop that sells the nutcracker chases after Kayla when she leaves the shop after finding that the nutcracker had been sold. Let me rephrase that:

A shop owner abandons her shop, when she is the only person working there, but leaves it open, to chase after a customer who simply didn't want to buy anything. It's ridiculous. To make matters worse, she has a thick German accent, and apparently try to pass her off as "quirky" because of this? Again, who is this for? It just can't be for adults, and it can't be for children either, because no one is of a low enough I.Q. to endure this nonsense.

For some reason, every time Kayla has a problem, she goes to speak to a man dressed as Father Christmas, who is collecting money for charity. The film sets him up like he's her guardian angel or something, although they never actually show us if he's supposed to be the real Santa or not. There's no reslolution as to who he truly is. That essentially leaves us with a woman in her thirties speaking to a stranger in fancy dress about her problems. It's just weird.

There's honestly so much more I could talk about, from Dustin and Kayla having flashbacks to their kiss, which is played onscreen for us, despite the audience being there to see it the first time around, to how Kayla calls for a taxi to pick her up, and then when the taxi arrives, the driver honks his horn, and Kayla says to Dustin "That's my cab." How would the driver know that this random woman -who has never been to this town before, and so has never used the cab service there- is the person he's supposed to be picking up from this destination he's been sent to, where there are plenty of buildings around, and presumably people in them who could be waiting for a cab. However, I feel my brain cells melting away the more time I spend thinking about this film. Please don't be like me. Please, please don't watch this awful film.

THE SCOREBOARD

Would I recommend this film? No.

Christmas quote of the film: "Yes, I know. Your parents never let you celebrate Christmas growing up, so now you have to make up for lost time." - Kayla

"Darling, please don't trivialise my childhood, it's my pain." - Carlton

Film rating: 1.5/10 - it's a one star film (the 0.5 is for Brant's performance, but sorry, it's still very much a one 1/10 film)