Champagne Problems Review – The Streaming Giant’s Newest Christmas Romcom Lacks Fizz.

At the risk of sound like a holiday cynic, one must lament the premature arrival of Christmas films before Thanksgiving. Even as the weather cools, it feels too soon to fully indulge in the platform’s yearly feast of low-cost festive treats.

Like US candy that no longer include genuine cocoa, the service’s Christmas movies are counted on for their style of badness. They offer rote familiarity – familiar actors, modest spending, fake snow, and absurd premises. At worst, these films are forgettable train wrecks; in the best scenarios, they are lighthearted distractions.

Champagne Problems, the newest holiday concoction, blends into the broad center of unremarkable territory. Helmed by Mark Steven Johnson, who previously previous romantic comedy was so disposable, this movie goes down like low-quality champagne – fittingly lackluster and context-dependent.

The story starts with what looks like an AI-generated ad for drug store brand champagne. This commercial is actually the pitch of the main character, portrayed by Minka Kelly, to her colleagues at the Roth Group. Sydney is the stereotypical image of a career woman – underestimated, constantly on her device, and ambitious to the detriment of her private world. When her superior dispatches her to France to finalize an acquisition over the holidays, her sister makes her promise take one night in Paris to live for herself.

Naturally, the French capital is the ideal location to pull someone from digital navigation, even when Paris is draped with unconvincing digital snowfall. At a absurdly cutesy bookstore, Sydney has a charming encounter with the male lead, who distracts her from her phone. As demanded by rom-com conventions, she at first rejects this perfect man for frivolous excuses.

Equally as expected are the film elements that unfold at abrupt quarter turns, reflecting the turning of old sparkling wine in the cellars of the family vineyard. The catch? Henri is the heir to Chateau Cassel, hesitant to run it and bitter toward his father for putting it up for sale. Maybe the movie’s most salient contribution to the genre, he is extremely judgmental of corporate buyouts. The problem? Sydney sincerely believes she’s not dismantling this family-owned company for profit, competing against three stereotypical rivals: a severe French grand dame, a severe blonde German man, and an out-of-touch wealthy man.

The twist? Her skeevy coworker Ryan shows up unannounced. The core? Henri and Sydney look yearningly at each other in holiday pajamas, despite a huge divide in economic worldview.

The gift and the curse is that none of this lingers longer than a short-lived thrill on an empty stomach. There’s a lack of real absorbent filler – Minka Kelly, still best known for her role in Friday Night Lights, delivers a merely adequate performance, all sweet surfaces and acts of kindness, more maternal than love interest material. Tom Wozniczka offers exactly the dollop of Gallic appeal with mild self-torture and little else. The tricks are not amusing, the love story is harmless, and the ending is straightforward.

Despite its philosophizing on the luxury of sparkling wine, no one is pretending it is anything but a mass market item. The things to hate are the very reasons some enjoy it. It’s fair to say a critic’s feelings about it a minor issue.

• The Holiday Film can be streamed on Netflix.