Let's cut to the chase; Meet Me Next Christmas starts this Netflix holiday viewing season right. The world is a bit grim right now, and for some of us, that means glomming hard onto holiday movies to distract us from real life. Throw in a helping of sparkling lights, snow-covered streets, and romance, and you've got a recipe for pure comfort.
In Meet Me Next Christmas that comfort comes in the form of Layla (holiday film vet Christina Milian, of annually-watched-in-my-house Snow Globe and Christmas Cupid fame), a spirited New Yorker who’s desperate to secure tickets to a sold-out Pentatonix Christmas Eve concert. But Layla’s quest isn’t just about music. It’s also wrapped in a sort-of love triangle between a suave charismatic man she spends all of two hours with at an airport and a helpful, nice guy she spends all of one day with. (Look, it's a Hallmark movie with a Netflix budget, ok.) The story unfolds as Layla attempts to help fate help her find true love, which apparently hinges on snagging those dang concert tickets. Not every holiday movie hits the mark. Thankfully, Meet Me Next Christmas hits the right spot, selling us on all the holiday romance goodness.
*SPOILERS FROM THIS POINT FOR MEET ME NEXT CHRISTMAS*
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.
Meet Me Next Christmas wastes no time setting up the conflict. We start off in Chicago at O’Hare airport. Layla sashays through the airport—like we all do—as Pentatonix plays on every screen. When her flight gets canceled due to the weather, she decides to chill in the corporate lounge. It's there she meets the suave James Never-gets-a-last-name (Kofi Siriboe) who's memorable enough that, one year later, James comes to mind after Layla catches her partner cheating on her ... in her home ... three days before Chistmas. She recalls their conversation and races to snag a highly coveted ticket to the Pentatonix holiday concert, the place they told each other they'd meet if fate worked out for them.
Unfortunately, the tickets are practically sold out. This is where Teddy (Devale Ellis) enters the picture, a concierge she hires to aid her quest.
Earnest and determined to go the extra mile, ticket concierge Teddy will do everything he can to get Layla that ticket. This mission to acquire the sacred Pentatonix ticket leads to questionable decisions and hilarious hijinks for the duo. From a clear suspicious scalper encounter going haywire to meeting up with an incredibly eccentric couple that’ll have you raising eyebrows to a slightly cringe drag-style dance-off, the two do whatever it takes to get a ticket.
Joy To The World.
While their adventures are incredibly entertaining, the joy of Meet Me Next Christmas is seeing how Layla and Teddy slowly grow attached, even if they don’t see it until the final moment. Everyone around them can see how hard Teddy is gunning for Layla, while Layla doesn’t realize what is under her nose. It is a tried-and-true romance cliche that can easily make one’s eyes roll. However, Milian’s and Ellis’s chemistry and natural flow make it impossible to judge too harshly. They make it easy to invest in their characters because of how well they mesh together.
The naturalness between Milian and Ellis is a huge factor in why the film sets a pretty high bar for what’s coming out from Netflix this holiday romance season. No one goes into these kinds of films expecting anything less than good ol’ holiday cheesiness. Sometimes, this results in stunted performances or really awkward couple matches that make you question what casting saw when pairing actors together. This is not the case here. The ease with which they sell their budding romance and how gung-ho they are to handle the crazed antics thrown at them makes the film enjoyable.
That’s Christmas To Me.
Of course, we can’t talk about Meet Me Next Christmas without tackling the inclusion of Pentatonix. The group is great in the film, delivering their respective lines with the energy you’d expect. There are even tongue-in-cheek moments poking fun at their random bursts of song that will generate a couple of laughs. Are they really necessary for the film plot itself? Not really. You could swap them in for any other musical group and get a similar result storywise. But the acapella group is so dang delightful that you can kind of ignore the generic archetypes they’ve been resigned to.
While the plot is pretty standard, Meet Me Next Christmas stands out with how kinetic Christina Milian and Devale Ellis are. Part of the joy in holiday rom-coms is being able to believe and invest in the couple onscreen. And their chemistry is so palpable, you’ll want to scream at them to hurry up and kiss already. Their performance elevates an otherwise formulaic plot, kickstarting the holiday romance season off on a high note.
4/5 ⭐: The aca-gods have looked down on us and have given us another Christina Milian Christmas gem.
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