Falling for Christmas (2022)

In November 2022, Lindsay Lohan returned to leading-role territory after nearly a decade away from major studio releases, and she did it through a Netflix Christmas movie about a spoiled heiress who gets amnesia on a ski slope. That sentence alone tells you everything about the risk calculus involved. Falling for Christmas is not trying to be a prestige film. It is trying to be the movie you put on while wrapping presents, and on those terms, it mostly delivers.

Lindsay Lohan's Comeback in Falling for Christmas

The plot is a greatest-hits compilation of romantic comedy tropes. Sierra Belmont (Lohan) is a wealthy, self-absorbed socialite engaged to a preening influencer named Tad Beaumont, played by George Young. After a skiing accident on the day before Christmas Eve, Sierra loses her memory and ends up in the care of Jake Russell (Chord Overstreet), a widowed lodge owner struggling to keep his small business afloat during the holidays. His young daughter Avy, played by Olivia Perez, rounds out the makeshift family unit.

None of this will surprise anyone who has seen more than three Christmas movies. The amnesia device has been a staple of holiday romances since long before Hallmark industrialized the format. But Lohan brings something that the script itself doesn't quite earn: genuine likability. She's funny in the physical comedy scenes, warm in the quiet ones, and she clearly knows exactly what kind of movie she's in.

The real story behind the camera was the comeback narrative. Lohan had signed a two-picture deal with Netflix, and this was the first. After years of tabloid headlines and a string of smaller projects, the streaming platform was betting that audiences still had affection for the star of Mean Girls and Freaky Friday. They were right. The film debuted at number one on Netflix's global charts.

The Falling for Christmas Cast and Who Steals the Show

Chord Overstreet, best known for his run on Glee, plays Jake as steady and sincere. He's the straight man to Lohan's comedy, and the chemistry between them is pleasant if never electric. The script doesn't give him much to work with beyond "nice guy who owns a lodge and misses his wife," but Overstreet commits to the role without irony.

George Young as Tad Beaumont is having the most fun of anyone in the cast. His influencer caricature is broad enough to qualify as a cartoon, but he leans into the absurdity with the right energy. The subplot where Tad wanders the wilderness trying to find Sierra while maintaining his social media presence is genuinely funny in spots.

Jack Wagner shows up as Sierra's father, and Sean Ringgold plays a supporting role. Neither gets enough screen time to make a real impression, which is a recurring problem in the film. The supporting cast exists to service the A-plot, and the movie knows it.

Where Was Falling for Christmas Filmed

Despite its snowy mountain setting, Falling for Christmas was filmed in Utah. The production used locations in and around the Salt Lake City area and the Wasatch Mountains to create its fictional ski resort town. The lodge interiors have that warm, wood-paneled coziness that Christmas movies depend on, and the exterior shots of snow-covered peaks give the film a more cinematic look than most made-for-streaming holiday fare.

Director Janeen Damian, who co-wrote the screenplay with her husband Jeff Damian, previously worked on a string of direct-to-video and television holiday movies. She knows the genre's rhythms by heart, and the film is competently paced at 95 minutes. It never drags, though it never surprises either.

Is Falling for Christmas Actually Good

Here is the honest assessment. Falling for Christmas is a three-star movie elevated to watchability by Lohan's screen presence and lowered back down by a script that treats its audience like they've never seen a romantic comedy before. Every plot beat arrives exactly when you expect it. The amnesia lifts at the precise moment that will cause maximum dramatic inconvenience. The rich fiance is cartoonishly awful so you never feel conflicted about rooting against him.

The Christmas elements are sincere, though. The lodge-decorating montage, the small-town holiday festival, the message about finding what matters beyond material wealth: these beats land because the film doesn't wink at them. It plays them straight, and there's something to be said for a Christmas movie that actually believes in its own premise.

Critics were divided. The film holds a 56% on Rotten Tomatoes, with most positive reviews crediting Lohan's charm and most negative ones pointing at the formulaic screenplay. That split feels fair. You already know if this movie is for you based on how you feel about Netflix Christmas originals in general.

What stays with you is not any particular scene but the simple fact that Lohan looks like she's enjoying herself. After everything, she sat down in a makeup chair, put on a ski jacket, and decided to be a movie star again. The vehicle is modest. The comeback it represents is not.