"The Perfect Holiday" isn't quite

As twinkly as tinsel and, alas, as bland as watery eggnog, Lance Rivera's "The Perfect Holiday" is a romantic comedy wrapped in Christmas paper. Nancy (Gabrielle Union) is a wealthy, lovely and lonely divorced mother of three, facing the holidays with a sigh. Benjamin (Morris Chestnut) is a handsome would-be songwriter and, as script contrivances would have it, a part-time mall Santa Claus who listens attentively when Nancy's little daughter whispers a few words in his ear. Would you, asks the tot, tell my mommy she's pretty? Benjamin happily complies, and off we go on the rom-com treadmill, as misunderstandings ensue and, eventually, love conquers all.

Rivera's movie does contain the essential ingredient for screen romance: Union and Chestnut are sweetly likable performers who create characters we want to see together. But the screenplay gives them far too many trumped-up obstacles, including Nancy's heartless ex-husband (Charlie Murphy), Benjamin's concern about "betrayal of the Santa Trust" (Nancy doesn't know the relationship began because of her daughter's intervention), and, worst of all, Queen Latifah and Terrence Howard as a sort of good-angel-bad-angel duo who keep popping up, commenting on and interfering with the action. (What lapse of judgment put Howard in this movie? He mostly looks embarrassed, while Latifah cozily addresses the camera, telling us things we already know.)

The children are cute, the interiors are sumptuous (Nancy, we're told, "has so much paper, when she walks down the street, trees get scared"), the product-placement Starbucks looks inviting and the obligatory best-friend sidekicks deliver their predictable supportive patter.

"The Perfect Holiday," as many a holiday movie before it, meticulously goes through the motions, but never quite finds the magic of the season.

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com