Chicago singles make dating pact in Netflix's raunchy rom-com 'Holidate'
“Holidate” - ★ ½
If it didn't actually exist, “Holidate” would sound like one of those fake movies within a movie.
A couple of attractive singles decide on a low-stakes, no-commitment arrangement to be each other's dates on holidays?
It's a perfect rom-com concept in that it's equal parts ridiculous and shamefully appealing. Slot in some very pretty people (Emma Roberts and Luke Bracey), a drunken aunt (Kristen Chenoweth), some bawdy dialogue and a picturesque and unbelievably warm Chicago where it's possible to wear spaghetti straps at Easter and it practically makes itself.
Unfortunately, like so many that have come before, it's pretty terrible, too (and that's taking into account the rom-com curve).
“Holidate,” available now on Netflix, is one of those extremely self-aware and cynical romantic comedies where the lead characters are neither romantics nor even particularly likeable.
This garbage person love story can work under the right circumstances, but that usually takes a sharp script to execute.
This script by Tiffany Paulson, with insights like “chicks go mental at the holidays,” is not that.
Roberts' Sloane is a chain-smoking, candy-scarfing waif who is meant to look slouchy and unkempt but always just looks like a gorgeous woman wearing a hoodie.
She had a bad breakup six months ago and now her little brother is engaged to a repressed stereotype and her mother (Frances Fisher) won't stop pestering her about men and marriage.
Bracey's Jackson, meanwhile, is a handsome Australian golf pro who just wants to sleep his way through the Windy City but also not be alone on holidays.
The “holidate” concept comes from Sloane's Aunt Susan (Chenoweth, giving a terrible role her all and not earning any laughs in the process). When Sloane meets Jackson in the returns line where they compare their terrible Christmases, they decide to give it a shot for New Year's.
Sloane and Jackson keep up the arrangement for the year, accompanying one another to Easter, St. Patrick's Day (it is Chicago), the Fourth of July and so on, denying their burgeoning feelings for one another as they go.
It wasn't a promising sign that I started checking my watch around Mother's Day, and the antics only get more absurd and exhausting.
That director John Whitesell was able to stretch this out for more than 90 minutes is pretty incredible and he uses everything in his arsenal from a hospital visit to a cheating subplot with a minor character to fill the time.
The best thing that “Holidate” has going for it is that Roberts and Bracey do have great chemistry, but they just don't have a story or a script that can do it justice.
Starring: Emma Roberts, Luke Bracey, Kristen Chenoweth, Frances Fisher
Directed by: John Whitesell
Other: A Netflix release. Rated TV-MA. 103 minutes