Movie Reviews

If you like your holiday fare served up sweet (and with few surprises), then chow down on this carb-loaded chick flick. But those averse to sugar coatings should seek something meatier.

Cameron Diaz is cutesy, klutzy and not quite credible as a Hollywood movie-trailer producer who kicks her two-timing boyfriend to the curb. Meanwhile, on the other side of the globe, British writer Kate Winslet pines pathetically for a coworker who treats her like crap. Hoping to escape their miserable lives and man troubles, these two stressed-out soul sisters swap homesteads for the holidays.

Hours after landing in London, Diaz starts shagging Winslet's brother, Jude Law—and both are so ridiculously beautiful you'd swear they're part of some genetically engineered superspecies. Back in Tinseltown, Winslet hooks up with octogenarian neighbor Eli Wallach. Eww, not like that—they're just friends! No, no, it's kooky composer Jack Black (thankfully restrained) who warms Winslet's cockles.

The luminous Winslet is the one actor who infuses this whole affair with genuine longing. Writer-director Nancy Meyer, whose Something's Gotta Give had greater depth and better casting, succumbs to rom-com conventions—references to classic movies, lots of quirky neuroses (Diaz can't cry; Law is a weeper!), rushing to and from airports and gratuitous dancing and air-guitaring to pop songs.

Enough, please.

Still, Meyer's dialogue is slick, her stars are lovingly photographed and she racks up enough warm-fuzzies to make this a more-happy-than-not Holiday.