In case any Jonas Brothers neophytes are watching the band of brothers’ new Christmas movie and having trouble telling the darkly handsome bro-boys apart, some dialogue about a third of the way through lays it all out.
“You were supposed to double check,” Joe complains to Nick about a holiday travel mishap. “You’re the uptight, responsible one.” Kevin then clarifies that Joe is the “lovable tramp,” and designates himself as the “handsome, relatable everyman,” though the other two disagree on that. (“Human cardboard,” Nick suggests, while Joe opts for “the one who still lives in New Jersey.”)
It’s a mildly amusing bit of self-critique, and legit helpful if your background in Jonas lore has more to do with whom they’ve married and/or divorced. These shorthand descriptions also track well enough to what the brothers have been projecting as those fictionalized versions of themselves for the first half-hour of their film – in theory, anyway. The traits are dutifully telegraphed, but the brothers’ collective screen presence remains on the recessive, surly side. They may be rock stars, of a sort (no one in the movie dares utter the phrase “boy band”); they’re also mostly-married thirtysomethings with kids who just want to get on with it.
To be fair, that’s sort of the plot of A Very Jonas Christmas Movie, streaming on Disney+ Nov. 14. After completing a tour in London on Dec. 23, the brothers plan to fly back to the states together, then go their separate ways for Christmas with their respective wives and/or children.
Joe, out drinking alone after his brothers rebuff his suggestion of a celebratory, raucous night out, complains to a stranger he doesn’t realize is Santa Claus (Jesse Tyler Ferguson) that the brothers haven’t been close lately – just going through the motions. Santa, scarcely learning any more about the situation or what the other bros think about this, immediately casts a spell that will divert their travels until they meaningfully reconnect with each other. (Santa really said f--- them kids, I guess.)
Hence their private plane explodes (before they board it), Heathrow Airport closes due to a storm, a train to Paris takes them to Amsterdam instead, and so on. Along the way, Joe bumps into a childhood pal (Chloe Bennet) with obvious romantic undercurrents.
This creates the bizarre incongruity of having two-thirds of the brothers refer to (and briefly share scenes with) their real-life families – as does Will Ferrell in a movie-opening cameo featuring his actual wife and kids – while Joe pantomimes a soulful fake romance with poor Bennet. “Do people pretend not to know literally everything about your personal life?” she asks him at one point, though luckily their deep connection nonetheless elides any real follow-ups that might get into legally prohibited specifics.
The weirdness might not be so obvious if the brothers felt more in their element in the rest of the movie. Yet even the elements tailor-made for them don’t put them at ease. This 78-minute movie is also a full musical, featuring seven short-ish songs, mostly with the Jonas Brothers performing the virtuoso task of singing while walking. Obviously not every song break can or should be a splashy production number, but the number of times the choreography reverts to a leisurely stroll goes a long way toward making A Very Jonas Christmas Movie feel particularly cheap and drab.
Why did these guys want to make a semi-parody of a Christmas movie, anyway? So they could walk around while some extras sweat to boost the production value? Even the most ambitious numbers, which the movie frontloads in a desperate gambit to conjure holiday whimsy, are sluggishly directed by jack-of-all-trades Jessica Yu (Quiz Lady; episodes of Only Murders in the Building; various documentaries; a Maria Bamford special).
There are a handful of laughs in A Very Jonas Christmas Movie, but for a self-consciously silly and lightweight made-for-streaming movie, there’s never a sense that the Jonas Brothers are doing this for fun.
It just feels like another piece of merch like the concert gear that so excites Ferrell (who, in a disconnected if amusing running gag, is portrayed as a singularly obsessed Jonas fan).
In one of the more baffling epilogues ever captured, the movie cuts to “one month later” just before the credits roll, with live footage seemingly designed to reassure the audience that the Jonas Brothers go on to… play more concerts. Whew? It feels especially redundant because this sorta-movie is clearly the work of artists who take for granted that they have a constant, undemanding audience.
