Last Christmas (2019)

Directed by: Paul Feig | 103 minutes | comedy, drama, romance | Actors: Emilia Clarke, Henry Golding, Michelle Yeoh, Emma Thompson, Boris Isakovic, Maxim Baldry, John-Luke Roberts, Bilal Zafar, Patti LuPone, Lydia Leonard

‘Last Christmas, I gave you my heart, but the very next day you gave it away’. The song ‘Last Christmas’ by Wham! – thirty-five years old now! – is perhaps the ultimate Christmas classic, and the ultimate guilty pleasure. George Michael wrote the song with the aim of reaching the coveted number 1 position in the British Christmas Charts. He and his companion Andrew Ridgeley, however, hadn’t anticipated that 1984 was a strong year for Christmas carols. Where Wham! Thought Frankie Goes To Hollywood, the formation that had firmly established itself on 1 early December with ‘The Power of Love’, would be the main competitor, it was Band Aid with ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’ that the smiling came third. ‘Last Christmas’ remained at number two, but managed to conquer a place in our hearts forever, thanks in part to the cheerful winter video where Michael and Ridgeley go on a winter sport with a group of friends and Michael secretly longs for the time when the woman who is now Ridgeley’s girlfriend, was his. Can it still be sticky? Actually not, but in the dark days before Christmas we like to immerse ourselves in this kind of sweet romance.

The song ‘Last Christmas’, along with the rest of George Michael’s oeuvre, was the source of inspiration for the 2019 romantic film of the same name by director Paul Feig, which we know from films such as ‘Bridesmaids’ (2011), ‘The Heat’ (2013), ‘Ghostbusters’ (2016) and ‘A Simple Favor’ (2018). The screenplay comes from none other than Emma Thompson, who conceived the story together with her husband Greg Wise and developed the script in collaboration with artist Bryony Kimmings, a debutant in the film world. Emilia Clarke (“Game of Thrones”) plays Kate, a stubborn young woman who doesn’t exactly have her life in order. A year earlier she was dying, but thanks to a donor she got a new heart and a new chance at a beautiful life. But Kate doesn’t take good care of herself. She drinks too much, doesn’t eat healthy, lives a riotous sex life and manages to disappoint her family and friends time and again. She dreams of a career as a singer, but a breakthrough is yet to come and until then has a shit job as an elf in a London store selling Christmas decorations all year round. She tries to maintain herself by attaching as little as possible to people and looking at the world around her with a cynical look. But then she meets the mysterious Tom (Henry Golding), who tries to show her what it’s really all about. He points out the beautiful sides of life, tries to give her hope. However, Kate’s sights are on survival mode and she isn’t exactly open to Tom’s “look up, not down” philosophy at first. As long as she cannot and will not put her past behind her, she will not be able to look ahead.

Thompson also pops up in a supporting role (as Kate’s not particularly easy mother Petra) and we also see Michelle Yeoh as Kate’s Christmas-crazed boss known as “Santa” who experiences her own unexpected romance. It is commendable that in her script, between the usual romantic worries and witty jokes, Thompson also leaves room for social themes such as the harrowing consequences of Brexit, the confrontational fate of the homeless, the paralyzing trauma of an illness and the increasingly vulnerable interpersonal relationships. For those admirable and brave choices, we forgive her for making some weird, naive, and unbelievable jumps towards the end of the script. Lead actors Clarke and Golding aren’t exactly subtle (just a moment lets Kate see how much pain, frustration and despair she feels in the aftermath of her illness), but both do portray warm characters we come to care about and wish for the best. .

And you can in fact extend that to the bigger picture: it doesn’t go very deep, the course of the story is very sweet and far from fine-grained, but we still embrace this film with love. Is it because of the solid cast, the good character of the characters, the atmospherically lit images of London, the stylish soundtrack with beautiful songs by George Michael? Or is it just that we need more genuine feel-good movies like this at this time of year?