Stewart is low key and likable, creating real emotional stakes and strategically using her signature shoulders-down shuffle. A pity, then, that she and Davis don’t quite have the romcom chemistry needed to secure the film’s place in the Christmas movie canon.

It’s never a good sign when characters in a film promptly declare: we are aware you are watching and we’re here to teach you a thing or two.

Tomris Laffly

RogerEbert.com

Everyone in the movie is excellent, everyone is tonally spot-on, and no one has a single bad moment – which is another way of saying that Clea DuVall, best known as an actress (“Veep,” “Argo”), is a real director. She has made one of the best Christmas movies of the millennium.

Mick LaSalle

San Francisco Chronicle