Written by: Todd Calgi Gallicano & Charles Shyer
Starring: Heather Graham, Brandy Norwood, Matt Cedeño, Jason Biggs
Rating: [2/5]
Comparison being the thief of joy has existed as a common saying for a reason, considering how accurately it summarizes the human tendency to fall into this trap. It happens to everyone to some degree, but ultimately one must have some semblance of control as to how much they will allow it to control their lives. In Best. Christmas. Ever! we see this flow to the extreme where this jealousy dares to crash and ruin the Christmas season, which we cannot stand for.
Feeling inadequate about the life she currently lives, Charlotte (Heather Graham) dreads getting the newsletters written by an old college friend, Jackie (Brandy Norwood) in the way she talks about her perfect life and her family’s latest achievements. After a snowstorm and interesting directions leaves Charlotte and her family at the doorstep of Jackie’s home they are now stuck there for the holidays.
There’s plenty one can expect from Christmas movies from a general negative in regard to quality, but not often do they have a deeply mean-spirited nature to them. Sure, they have cartoonish meanness like Scrooge, but the level of hatred flowing through the veins of Charlotte reach a new level of envy in this subpar film. Sure, everyone likes to compare themselves to others, especially when it shows oneself doing better, but the degree to which Charlotte lets this fester even streaming down to her family reaches a whole new level. It goes beyond something petty and displays some deep-rooted hate that proves unbecoming for Charlotte as a character.
Leading up to how Charlotte and her family end up at Jackie’s takes a level of mental gymnastics that would land you at the Olympics but it well and truly sets the stage for the ridiculousness of this story. The idea that they could mistakenly find their way to Jackie’s house out of a bit of sarcasm boggles the mind, and things only get worse when they find themselves trapped there and Charlotte begins this mission to expose her former college friend’s lies she knows somehow exist. The film then jumps around to all of these moments where she snoops around and tries to dig up some dirt that only further begs the questions of why we are placed in the position to root for this woman as a character. She has this internalized battle of this enemy she has built in her head that centers on there being no way someone could actually be happy like Jackie, especially Charlotte, herself, is deeply disappointed in the way her life has turned out.
For all the criticism, it gives Charlotte at least some semblance of character growth, but it does not remedy the strangely sharp mean-spirited nature of the film. One would expect with this being a Christmas film that it would all come together with a happy ending and the characters learning the lesson we have gathered them together to do, but man everything preceding it is so rotten to the core it does not allow me to care even for a smidgen for where this character goes. We just sit here and watch this woman degenerate everyone around her from her husband, kids, and the generous hosts who seek to provide them a Christmas worth remembering.
At the very least, it comes at a mercifully short runtime of 81 minutes, this film serves as a wonderful example of ironic titling as “best” should be nowhere near a description of what goes on here. The humor of this only exists in the ways of laughing at what transpires and the insane logic utilized in order to piece it all together. While I love Heather Graham is receiving a paycheck for starring in this feature, she received absolutely nothing to work with and a character not even the best actors could salvage. It all culminates into something incredibly rancid for a season meant to highlight the sweeter moments of life, and this feature has none of it. The entire premise makes any move to make a character like Charlotte palatable ring hollow and only further display this film had no real chance for success. While plenty of worse Christmas movies exist, this one definitely exists in its own bad category.
Films with Josh 
