Watched on: Netflix
Originally aired: November 24, 2025
Directed by: Melissa Joan Hart
Starring: Rita Moreno, Emily Kinney, and Justin Gaston
Please see IMDb for full cast and crew info.
Synopsis
Hired by shopping mall magnate Ed Mancini to host a Christmas gala for his biggest investors, Emily heads to Santa Bootcamp - to find the perfect Santa and the inspiration she'll need to make the evening a success.
Review
I have had an interesting mix of holiday movies this year, with a couple happening in locations where it's not really known to snow much. As a native Kansan who has never lived south of the Mason Dixon line, although we didn't routinely have snow on Christmas, I'm still used to having snow near Christmas, so these warmer climates as settings are kind of throwing me off.
Anyway, Emily Strauss has been gifted her dream party planning opportunity days before Christmas, for a moron who thinks it's reasonable to not only fire his party planner but also the arranged caterer for his big fancy party just days before Christmas. And since this could be her big break, Emily says yes to the job. She might be an even bigger moron than the guy who hired her. And his one big ask is that she needs to have the perfect Santa Claus for the party, like he really needs to embody Santa. Again, she has days to pull this whole thing together. Luckily for her, she happens to be walking down the street when she's basically smacked in the face with a flyer for Santa Bootcamp, run by Belle, a no-nonsense Christmas drill instructor. Obviously all she has to do is go ask the woman running the show to hook her up with a great Santa and her problem is solved, right?
You knew the answer to that was wrong. This is a cheesy Christmas movie after all and it could not be that simple. No, as a condition of getting the name of the perfect Santa, Emily must first go through the boot camp as well, she clearly needs the boost in her Christmas cheer. And when her chemistry with the 60 year old she's role playing with is just not vibing, Belle drags her hunky chef into the boot camp as well, on scholarship, insisting that her assistant hire him a sous chef immediately to free up his time. Matchmaker, matchmaker...
There were some really great highlights to this movie for me. One of them is that Emily is fluent in American Sign Language because her mom is deaf. At least, I presume the character is fluent as I had to do a lot of reading during this movie because I am NOT, and there were several scenes where no words were verbalized with mouths. It was a nice touch. And I'll give you three guesses about who Belle is.
So is this a Christmas movie? Honestly, it really has to be because it's all about doing activities to bring out the latent Christmas cheer in workaholic Scrooges. And it didn't even require the workaholic to move to a small town and marry a lumberjack.
Overall I give this movie 3.125 out of 5 Santa hats. - Katie
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