To explain “The Merry Gents” as “The Full Monty” meets a Christmas-themed Hallmark film could be overselling the products. Nevertheless, that’s basically the elevator pitch for this function, through which a big-city dancer returns to her small city to avoid wasting her mother and father’ live performance venue by having hunks go shirtless on stage. But director Peter Sullivan and author/co-star Marla Sokoloff’s providing within the Netflix Vacation Cinematic Universe is uninventive, uninspired and introduced with noticeably sloppy wrapping. Not solely does the story flail looking for its footing after a well-presented first act, a number of the extra cost-conscious points detract from the image’s significant, understated sentiments.

Single, 30-something Ashley (Britt Robertson) resides the dream, excessive kicking and faucet dancing in The Jingle Belles Christmas Revue and recouping from exhibits in her picturesque condo in New York Metropolis. These days, although, she’s feeling somewhat out of step with the remainder of the corporate. Simply when a brand new member joins the troupe, Ashley known as into her boss’ workplace and unceremoniously let go, as she pointedly voices, attributable to her advancing age. Discovering herself washed up far too younger and determined for a recharge, Ashley hightails it residence for the vacations to snow-covered Sycamore Creek, situated in an unspecified Midwestern state by the use of a poorly disguised Burbank backlot.

Ashley’s arrival is met with a heat welcome all throughout city, from the greasy spoon diner her older sister Marie (Sokoloff) owns to live-music-bar The Rhythm Room, the place she clumsily pratfalls into cute carpenter Luke’s (Chad Michael Murray) life. The outlet-in-the-wall, owned by Ashley’s big-hearted mother and father Stan (Michael Gross) and Lily (Beth Broderick), was as soon as host to rock-and-rollers and royalty (a wise nod to “The Princess Change”). Nevertheless, it’s now residence to barfly Danny (Maxwell Caulfield) and a stack of comically-large-stamped past-due payments. Dealing with eviction and $30,000 in debt, Ashley launches an all-male revue to rescue the institution, roping in the one native males she is aware of: Marie’s husband Rodger (Marc Anthony Samuel), bartender Troy (Colt Prattes) and Luke, who can’t resist these in want, particularly Ashley.

To the narrative’s detriment, the movie doesn’t stray removed from the protected confines of outdated formulation, whereby a metropolis dweller finds love in a small city and workaholics are chided for selecting a profession over love. These filmmakers have to step up their recreation in the event that they need to cling alongside smarter-constructed shared universe titles like “A Fort For Christmas” and, most not too long ago, “Sizzling Frosty.” Confounding components proliferate the image, principally coping with character behaviors and conditions that both pressure credulity (just like the Santa photo-op nonetheless operating previous the bar’s closing time) or result in extra questions than solutions. Why would Marie cover her courting previous with a male stripper from Rodger, when he’s greater than prepared to doff his prime in entrance of a gaggle of screaming girls?

Social media exists on this world, as TikTok is talked about in an early scene, however no one makes use of it in any respect to assist fill the membership with patrons. Absolutely Ashley’s dancing profession would’ve assured she had an account and a wholesome fan following. As an alternative, she and Marie go out flyers within the city sq. and await journalists to choose up their story. That’s high quality for a film happening earlier than smartphones had been invented, however not for one set on this tech-heavy period. Plus, it’s odd that the movie takes nice pains to be extraordinarily heteronormative, exhibiting no male patrons attending these occasions (except the one man working the A/V board). It pays no thoughts to the potential LGBTQ+ viewers watching, when it might’ve seized a possibility to be as progressive and inclusive as others within the rising Netflix Vacation Cinematic Universe (“Single All of the Approach” and “Falling For Christmas”).

Every of the routines is given an aesthetic identification, with Sullivan conducting a refrain of complicated choreography, saturated stage lighting, music-video-style enhancing and costumes starting from a building employee to a Chippendale dancer. The novices exhibit their six packs as they physique roll to an aggressively generic soundtrack (apparently all licensed from the manufacturing firm’s personal secure of music artists). Nonetheless, these numbers really feel like reductive, forgettable iterations of these in “Magic Mike.” They may make aged audiences blush, however provided that relations are round.

There are highlights. Sullivan and Sokoloff pay respectful homage to their cinematic inspiration within the first montage, exhibiting the blokes’ infectious love of dance crossing over to their each day lives — cooking on the grill, storing a toolbox and making cocktails. Robust anti-corporate messaging is tucked away within the margins, from Marie’s motivation for purchasing the diner to the battle to maintain the venue from a juice bar takeover. Lens flares middle viewers within the characters’ psyches, whether or not it’s when our heroine experiences an epiphany or when the narrative’s emotional drive ramps up.

The members of the ensemble elevate the flawed materials as greatest they will. Robertson makes for an ideal main woman, delivering a slapstick-y tumble as effectively as she accesses vulnerability to make her protagonist’s arc empathetic. Murray is, after all, charming, including sizzle and verve to the proceedings. With regards to tertiary supporting gamers, Caulfield is a blessed casting alternative, along with his presence reinforcing the theme of reinvention. In spite of everything, he performed a bookish nerd-turned-biker in “Grease 2” and seductive pop star Rex Manning in “Empire Data.” Right here, he steals the highlight.

Sentiments surrounding girls unearthing hidden reserves of resilience, persevering and thriving of their second-life profession selections are assuredly heartening — maybe one thing Sokoloff herself skilled mixing performing along with her work behind the digital camera, writing and directing different movies. Nonetheless, the predictable climactic battle undoes the groundwork beforehand laid with these feminist notions, putting a finer level on romance as a substitute of self-worth. Had the filmmakers advanced from the anticipated to the surprising, this vacation romp would’ve been extra merry and vibrant.