The Knight Before Christmas
Cast: Vanessa Hudgens, Josh Whitehouse
Director: Cara J Russel
The thing about most popular Christmas movies is that they are mostly template romantic comedies. Girl is heartbroken and/or a mess, girl meets perfect boy who cleans up her mess, they fall in love and live happily ever after. Vanessa Hudgens’ The Knight Before Christmas is a similar template Christmas film with a time-traveling twist.
A 14th century English Knight meets an ‘Old Crone' who sends him to 2019 Ohio in search of a quest which will make him a true knight and he has until the midnight of Christmas Eve to do so. The now confused knight then literally bumps into Brooke, a high-school teacher whose introductory scene is where she is telling her student to focus on her goals as true love is just a fantasy. But everything changes when she hits this knight with her car and thinks she is responsible for his memory loss.
Vanessa Hudgens plays Brooke who gives shelter to Sir Cole Christopher Frederick Lyons, played by Josh Whitehouse and goes along with his apparent delusion because, well, he is gorgeous. The rest of the film is Cole adjusting to his new life and Brooke processing her feelings toward her new guest.
The film doesn’t have layered plotlines and confrontations. In fact, the trailer actually gives away the best parts of the film, including the very romantic confession at the end of the film. There is a scene in the trailer where the Knight asks Brooke if she is a witch because he opened the doors to her car with the buttons on her keys, which is really funny but never makes it to the actual movie.
The time-traveling and adjusting part is not really fleshed out well and the laughs are also limited to the first quarter of the film. There are various characters that come and go without contributing to the progress of the film. The main couple's story is also simplified and their big separation lasts literally for a day.
Performance wise, it’s a Josh Whitehouse film, there is not much that is required from the characters here, but he is still brilliant as the flawless, invincible and righteous knight who is inappropriate for 2019 and brings the much needed comic relief in the film.
Vanessa Hudgens, who is supposed to be the star headlining the film, soon becomes a secondary character with too much similarity with her High School Musical character Gabriella Montez. She has now become the face of fairytale romcoms on Netflix, her previous work being The Princess Switch, but being the producer of this film, she could have at least ensured that her character had a second name.
The Knight Before Christmas is an easy breezy one time watch, which brings much necessary breaks from Manic Pixie Dream Girls by introducing a Manic Pixie Dream Boy. The film ends up with a hint of a sequel, which we don’t think is really necessary.
Rating- 2.5/5
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