All the heterosexual nonsense I was forced to endure during A Castle For Christmas
Castles are not heterosexual nonsense, but thinking landlords are hot definitely is
Hark! We’re BACK and we’re recapping more Christmas films, and this time we’re doing A Castle for Christmas, and look, it’s better than last weeks stupid farm movie. I guess castles are just more romantic than farms, SORRY TO THIS FARMER.
So this film is about a woman who rediscovers love at Christmas all through the impulse purchase of a large Scottish castle. This is relatable. There’s a lot of nonsense, but it’s not really objectionable.
Let us recap:
DREW BARRYMORE
Bec: I had seen the trailer for this movie, people talking about it online, buzz buzz buzz, but what I didn’t realise was that Drew Barrymore would be one of the main characters.
Patrick: Did Drew Barrymore fund this film, or does the director of this film know a terrible secret about her? Why is she in it? Does she actually have a talk show in real life?
Bec: She DOES have a talk show in real life! And it wasn’t even Drew Barrymore the actress in this movie, it was Drew Barrymore as herself, Drew Barrymore, on her talk show. Conservatively 40 minutes is taken up by this talk show. Including bloopers, but they were fake??
Patrick: Yes, to give the film the touch of realism that it so sorely needs, like a sprinkle of salt on a big stupid cake.
Bec: What is this scenario where a cake needs a sprinkle of salt?
Patrick: PRECISELY.
Bec: Okay well, this movie (the cake) was very well salted by Drew Barrymore? Is that right? And all our senses were assaulted.
Patrick: in much the same way that i don’t know how to bake, this movie doesn’t know how to be a movie.
Bec: and in all cases, there are soggy bottoms (not sure if this is tracking).
Patrick: Let us simply move on, metaphors are all about confidence.
AUTHORS
Patrick: SPEAKING OF METAPHORS, Brooke Shields is a very popular author… named….
Bec: Book Shields?
Patrick: yep thats it. Anyway, she’s a romance author who earns a huge amount of money, but because her marriage had broken down, she’d written a book in which the main love interest, Winston (sexiest name in the world) DIES. And her fans HATE her because of this.
Bec: her fans, including Drew Barrymore, literally take to the streets. It’s like riots over this death. And every single person we meet in the movie, internationally as well, all not only have heard of her, but recognise her immediately. She’s bigger than JK Rowling, and also has a life-sized cardboard cutout of herself at home. Not sure if she’s a TERF, it didn’t come up. Maybe in the sequel.
Patrick: I would have a lifesize cutout of myself at home if I could, it’s important to celebrate your wins
Bec: Is this you admitting you already do have one?
Patrick: yes
Bec: but yours is for sexual purposes, so it’s different.
Patrick: it’s hard because we’re both pillow princesses (hmm not sure about this RESCUE ME)
Bec: Do I look like I am part of the team at Bondi Rescue???? Anyway, Book Shields has written 20 books and is extremely wealthy and her agent is screaming at her for another book, which just goes to show, life is never good.
Patrick: Once again, another author, and another agent, have christmas rom-com film writers heard of literally any other job? And we need to stop making writers seem glamorous, it’s a trash job for the rat people of the world
Bec: so much of this movie is Brooke riding around on a bicycle smiling, and no authors i know have ever done that once in their miserable lives. They all have vitamin D deficiencies, like those children in The Others.
Patrick: im sure its easy its like riding a bicycle
Bec: I’m going to kill you like that dirty dog Winston. Anyway I did like, however, the realistic moment where Brooke was writing her book, in Scotland, about the castle, and her computer screen showed her writing in a word doc with the background featuring a picture of the castle. Huge writing tip there. Write what you see. On your screensaver.
Patrick: my screensaver is your face
Bec: Please do not write about me.
CASTLE/TO WOMEN BUYING CASTLES
Bec: Speaking of the castle…what did you think of the castle? It was a main character, much like New York in Sex and the City.
Patrick: Or like Paris in Emily In Paris. I honestly felt like it was more of a manor than a castle, I wanted turrets and a moat and… knights. But it just seemed like an uncomfortably large house, that is old. But it was pretty. I liked when they put lights all over it.
Bec: It seemed like a large house, but one that for some reason a man was giving guided tours of. At one point Cary Ewles (sp? I dont care) said that in the ballroom they used to have meetings of the clan, and I immediately assumed he meant the KKK. I forgot we were in Scotland.
Patrick: were you not convinced by the many Americans doing terrible Scottish accents that we were in the highlands of bonny scotland?
Bec: Oh my god, Cary Ewles doing a Scottish accent was just so unbelievably bad.
Patrick: It was Scary Ewws more like it
Bec: I’m sending that to him. I'm going to @ him on twitter.
Patrick: In their defence, Scotland has never had a male actor.
Bec: At one point when his dog attacks Brooke Shields but we are meant to think the dog likes her, he says the line “do you ‘ave meat in yer pocket” and there was something so disturbing about it, i wanted to kilt myself (scotland joke).
Patrick: “No i’m just happy to see you”
MONARCHY/LANDLORDS
Bec: Cary also was meant to be a Duke of Scotland or something, which means he should sound less like he’d spent 10 years overseas, acquiring a Josh Thomas hybrid accent. Oh wait I do remember he is a duke because of the iconic joke Brooke says “if it walks like a duke and talks like a duke it is a duke”. Now that, is comedy.
Patrick: it’s funny because it reminds us that he’s a duke, in a factual manner the whole family can enjoy.
Bec: Just realised Duke sounds like Dyke sort of. Dukes on Bikes. Why am I not writing for netflix??
Patrick: Dukes in Books
Bec: This movie was strange for many reasons but one of those reasons was that everyone in the town loved the Duke and the monarchy that owned them, and also loved that he was their landlord??? A pro-landlord movie. Literally land lords.
Patrick: of course they loved their landlord, there wasn’t a single millennial or young person in the whole town (the natural enemy of the landlord), so the whole ecosystem was out of whack. When the landlords are allowed to live amongst their own kind, they form a hierarchical society where the richest landlord (Duke Scary Ewws) is the boss.
Bec: I’m really not convinced you know that much about this at all. How much salt do landlords need? I just think any movie where someone says the line “you couldn’t find a better landlord” is automatically a horror film, unspeakably scary. Now if they said GAYLORD, I would feel much better.
Patrick: If it was a gaylord, he would be inexplicably mute.
GAY MAN WHO DOESN’T SPEAK
Bec: What the HELL was with the one gay character not being able to speak? That’s literally our one thing.
Patrick: Much like Scotland has no actors, they also couldn’t find a gay to check the dialogue, and it is HARD to know where to drop the “Yass” and “slay” in a sentence if you’re not comfortable.
Bec: That’s a good point. So, this gay man didn’t speak because his husband had died, and he hadn’t said a word since. Sorry, if my husband died, you would not shut me up. I would be called ‘the chatty widow’.
Patrick: If my husband died, I would not grieve through silence. I would grieve… through soooooooooong *orchestral music is playing*
Bec: Okay, starting a petition to make gay marriage illegal specifically for you.
Patrick: we need Evil Sally Rugg to make it happen
Bec: Sorry, i realised earlier we forgot to mention that at some point Brooke Shields buys the castle and they have a scene where they cheers “women buying castles”. They hate to see a Girlboss winning.
Patrick: we👏 need 👏 more 👏 castles 👏 full 👏 of 👏 rich👏 women
THE LEADS
Bec: I actually didn’t mind Brooke Shields in this! It was nice to see an older woman getting to have sex with a man doing a terrible accent. Usually that’s a young woman’s game.
Patrick: it was very funny when someone said that she had “her grandfathers smile”. Was her grandfather also completely unable to move her face in any fashion?
Bec: maybe they meant a grandfather clock? A little bird comes out of her mouth on the hour.
Patrick: and if you look inside her, there’s Narnia.
Bec: Im going to be annoying and link in my own tweet here because there is an insane moment in the big romantic scene where the duke almost pulls her arm out of her socket.
It’s so strange that it’s the take they went with. Do you think this movie was shot in one take?
Patrick: I genuinely do, i think all the budget went into renting that stupid castle, so they had like one day to film. Also, the UK gets about 3 hours of sunlight per year, so they had to use that too.
KNITTING CIRCLE
Bec: What I learned about Scotland from this movie was that if you go into an Inn, a group of people will be sitting there knitting in a circle regardless of what time of day or night it is, and they are also the only customers of that Inn. Also at one point someone describes her grandfather as a ‘McMotormouth’ and I 1) forgot Scotland was big on the ‘Mc’ thing and said out loud ‘they wouldn’t have had Mcdonalds back then?’ because 2) I also forgot it was set in the current day. These are the things I admit to our readers. To humanise me.
Patrick: i genuinely believe she liked her knitting friends more than the Duke, and it was a love story about a woman who meets some knitting weirdos and then becomes their landlord.
Bec: Now THAT I would watch! Except I already did. She met her weird knitting friends and also their friend, the silent gay man. Also the Duke was a cunt to her like 85% of this movie. And not even rich, like a Duke.
Patrick: There’s no point in a poor duke, that’s just me. (fancy little boy with a blood disease, but penniless)
Bec: omg you are definitely the duke in this scenario. Every co-recapping team has one Duke and one JK Rowling.
PRINCESS SWITCH UNIVERSE
Patrick: canonically all netflix xmas films are set in the same universe, i’m not even joking
Bec: There was a very confusing scene where a man and a woman checked into the Inn and we watched their entire scene of being checked in, and I was like ‘okay who are these two villains, are they going to try and buy the castle and turn it into a mcdonalds?” but no they just apparently are from another film?
Patrick: they are extremely inconsequential characters from The Princess Switch. They are a butler and whatever the equivalent of a lady butler is. Butless?
Bec: Why are butlers always so horny? So much of The Nanny is about Niles ‘butlering’ CC Babcock. Butlering means cunninlingus. Sorry I just went into my own head then, thinking about a butler bringing you cunnilingus under a cloche. Clochue? What is that thing called, tell me, I need it for this great butler bit i’m continuing.
Bec (again): I just googled “silver food cover dome” and i’m right, it’s cloche. Anyway back to this netflix family movie.
Patrick: I think it’s time to “cloche” this section
VACCINATED
Patrick: BEC WHO DO YOU THINK IN THIS MOVIE WOULD BE VACCINATED?
Bec: Okay well, Brooke is definitely vaccinated. That woman is not afraid of needles, plus she has to go to Scotland when the Book Riots happen. I sort of think everyone is vaccinated except for the Duke.
Patrick: the duke is into “natural agriculture” or something and is also “a massive cunt” so definitely.
SHOULD YOU WATCH
Bec: Patrick, Duke of the Dykes. Would you recommend people watch?
Patrick: yes! This is a little bit bad, but unlike Chrisntams on the farm, it’s FUN and good natured, and even though Book Shields is weird and rich, I do want the best for her. What about you?
Bec: I also think yes! It’s a castle and people in scarves and an insane author and a mean duke. It’s fun! Especially watch if you like to see gay people, but hate to see them speak! And if you are only watching because you’re a huge fan of Drew Barrymore’s talk show, you will be very satisfied.
Thank you so much for reading our silly recap! If you’re new, please consider subscribing so we can afford to keep writing! We’re both freelance writers, and literally every day we spend writing something we love (like this ridiculous project) means money we’re stealing away from ourselves by not writing high paid ad copy for a new range of millennial toasters or something.
We’re going to do another two christmas films, and then take a break, and come back in late January to start recapping some shows, as well as a couple of other cool projects (agony aunt??????? Agonising Uncle?)