A Cinderella Story: Christmas Wish Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		1.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.0
Overall		1.0

A Cinderella Story: Christmas Wish Blu-ray Movie Review

Yule hate it.

Reviewed by Randy Miller III November 7, 2019

Let's be honest: the folk tale of Cinderella, best known by both of those Disney variants, offers a dismal core message: the only way out of an abusive family relationship is attracting a rich, handsome man. But Disney's live action film, as well as looser adaptations like 1998's Ever After and the modern spin of A Cinderella Story, at least attempted to breathe some fire into the title character, albeit with mixed results...and as bad luck would have it, the latter spawned several direct-to-video sequels that thrust Cinderella into the smartphone generation. Christmas Wish continues the trend with a predictable, shallow, and paint-by-numbers story that doubles down on that dismal core message.

Teenage Kat (Laura Marano) dreams of pop stardom and YouTube subscribers...but stepmother Dierdra (Johannah Newmarch), along with sisters Grace (Chanelle Peloso) and Joy (Lillian Doucet-Roche), would rather humiliate her at every turn. After a video of Kat's most recent embarassment goes viral, she's happy to hide behind her costume at the local "Santaland" Christmas village, sharpening her song-and-dace skills while pining after the cute guy in the Santa suit. Turns out he's really the rich and totally sensitive Dominic Wintergarden (Gregg Sulkin), a hopeful music manager whose inattentive dad Terence (Barclay Hope) owns the whole show. If only they could get together, you guys!

Its predictable plot is bad enough, but Christmas Wish's shallow sentiments are what really sink the ship. You'd think that any modern adaptation of Cinderella would attempt to shed the skin of its source material, but this production shoots itself in the foot by making Kat just as shallow as her captors. The best Cinderella adaptations have made her more strong-willed while also giving the villains a few layers in the process: here, the mom and sisters are obnoxious assholes for no real reason, a screenplay shortcut that drums up artificial sympathy for its bland main character. (The ridiculously auto-tuned pop songs don't help matters either.) If Christmas Wish has one bright spot it's the half-decent choreography; no surprise, given that returning writer/director Michelle Johnston has roots in dance herself. But this is a largely thoughtless affair that does absolutely nothing to advance the original story and is best avoided.

A Cinderella Story: Christmas Wish Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in its original 1.78:1 aspect ratio, A Christmas Wish looks just fine for a digitally-shot production. Colors are vivid and well-saturated, especially the festive costume designs and backdrops, while skin tones and neutral colors stand in good contrast. Image detail is hardly razor sharp but pleasingly consistent, likely due to stylistic choices that give the production a slightly gauzy and dreamlike appearance. (This also explains the lack of depth, which perhaps unintentionally makes certain scenes look like a stage production.) Yet the lack of compression artifacts, banding, and other digital eyesores at least means that Warner Bros.' has made the most of this source material.

A Cinderella Story: Christmas Wish Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Similarly, the DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio mix does its job well without aiming for the back seats. Although largely dialogue-driven, a number of full-blown music breaks liven up an otherwise front-loaded affair, offering good dynamic range and a punchy atmosphere that rarely sounds overcooked. Otherwise, panning effects and rear channel activity are fairly limited, while monologues and overlapping conversations are mixed well without fighting for attention.

Optional English (SDH) subtitles are included during the main feature and all applicable extras.

A Cinderella Story: Christmas Wish Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• The Looks and Costumes of Christmas Wish (5:33) - Costume designer Valerie Halverson and key cast members briefly talk about Christmas Wish's production design and colorful outfits.

• The Mic and the Stage (11:04) - "I love all the music in this movie. It's so good!", gushes lead actress Laura Marano with a straight face. So sets the stage for this brief overview of the film's auto-tuned pop songs, another surface-level featurette that almost made my eyes roll completely out of my skull.

• Trailers (5:04) for The Sun is Also a Star and Detective Pikachu.

A Cinderella Story: Christmas Wish Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Flat, lifeless, and completely predictable, Christmas Wish offers a paint-by-numbers adaptation of Cinderella for the smartphone generation. Sure, I'm not the target market, but they deserve better than this direct-to-video dud. Warner Bros.' Blu-ray offers a solid A/V presentation and two fluffy featurettes, but who cares when the movie's this bad?