by John Tillyard, Contributing Writer
My Secret Santa is basically a gender-swapped version of Mrs. Doubtfire set at Christmas. Similar to the Robin Williams classic, Taylor Jacobson (Alexandra Breckenridge) keeps her double life secret from everyone except her brother and his partner, who help her put together the disguise. The idea of gender-swapping Mrs. Doubtfire is something I can get behind. Still, it works so well in that story because of Williams’ performance: his screen presence in both roles is so compelling, adding a lot of comedy. Breckenridge’s performance doesn’t offer that, nor are the two roles she plays written in a way that offers up any opportunity for major comedy. So without that element of comedy to make this idea work, My Secret Santa depends on a good story and characters.
Having lost her job right before Christmas, single mother Taylor must figure out how to pay for her daughter Zoey’s (Madison Maclsaac) snowboarding tuition. With no other job available, she decides to disguise herself as a Santa and work at a ski resort under the alias Hugh Mann. As well as concealing her secret double life, Taylor must deal with potentially falling in love with Matthew Layne (Ryan Eggold), the son of the resort’s manager Robert (Barry Levy), her daughter being the target of bullying at the school, and paying rent to her superintendent Doralee (Diana Maria Riva).
However, the story quickly resorts to a standard rom-com, with flat characters who could have been better developed with more screen time. Matthew, for example, has a reputation as a troublemaker who is constantly having problems with the law, but we learn of this only through dialogue; we never see any evidence of it on screen. Matthew always comes across as a perfectly straight, charming man — the last person you would ever imagine being arrested. A lot of the film’s plot points are like that; we are told them without ever really seeing supporting evidence. There are several other moments where hints of proper development or the background of certain characters are alluded to, but nothing is done with them. The runtime is bang-on 90 minutes, exactly the length a story like this should be, so it’s odd how many different characters and subplots are in here. There is a clear vibe of a much longer original screenplay that had to be massively shaved down.
While the main plot focuses on a fairly standard romance between Taylor and Matthew, one unique element is that they share several scene in which Taylor is disguised as Hugh, allowing Matthew to bond with her without even knowing it. This helps give their chemistry a much more genuine feel, and their romance is adequately earned by the end. Disappointingly, there is only one scene where Taylor, as Hugh, talks to Zoey, so while the story does a decent job of developing the romance, the mother-daughter part is severely lacking.
On the whole, Zoey’s character feels like the biggest victim of the cutting room floor. She is given a brief background on her snowboarding history, and it is shown that she has a good relationship with her mother. When Taylor admits she isn’t sure she can afford for Zoey to learn snowboarding, Zoey is completely mature about it, accepting that she can’t go. There are seeds planted early for a possible character arc, as she is shown to be the victim of bullying, but none of this goes anywhere. As a result, Zoey comes across as a character who exists solely to justify Taylor’s need to earn more money.
With this being a Christmas film, there is of course a massive feel-good factor to everything, and an ongoing theme of families being brought together. It’s a factor that often irritates me in a lot of Christmas films because of how over the top they go with the schmaltz, but it’s actually not too bad here. As a mature 18-year-old, Zoey doesn’t get upset with her mother. There is a minor subplot with another character feeling shunned by their parents, but thankfully, it’s not given too much focus. Some other nice scenes of the kids meeting Taylor as Santa show Taylor gradually getting better at her job. There is also an interesting theme: Life often gets in the way of your dreams, but it’s never too late to bring them back.
The film does an excellent job of looking Christmasy. With it mostly set at a ski lodge, there is plenty of snow to look at, and the interior shots are fully decked out with Christmas decorations. The characters are also dressed in either vibrant red (mainly Taylor) or deep green.
My only major negative with the story is the ending. The entire final act does the same thing as the final act of Mrs. Doubtfire. It doesn’t come across quite as ludicrous here as it does in the Williams film, but it’s pretty ridiculous how quickly characters switch back and forth, as well as the fact that no one seems to notice. It all feels massively unoriginal, farcical, and out of step with the rest of the story. It’s odd My Secret Santa would copy this part of Mrs. Doubtfire, since outside of the basic setup, the two films’ stories really don’t have anything else in common. It also doesn’t help that the climax to Mrs. Doubtfire is by far my least favorite part of that film.
Overall, My Secret Santa doesn’t borrow too heavily from Mrs. Doubtfire, and what it does borrow for the most part is different enough that it doesn’t feel like a ripoff. Having said that, there isn’t much here that hasn’t been seen in many other family and Christmas stories over the years. The narrative structure suffers from too many subplots that don’t really go anywhere, or are resolved a bit too abruptly. It has a few nice scenes of characters just talking, and some emotional moments, but with such a modest runtime, much of the development of character relationships and character arcs is forced to happen off screen. But what happens on screen is all perfectly fine: there are some fun, humorous moments, and all the characters are likable. The film just goes overboard on subplots and side characters; it’s like a well-cooked Christmas Turkey with too much stuffing.
Rating: It Was Just Okay
My Secret Santa is currently streaming on Netflix
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