Chalet Girl - a funny and easy to watch romcom

It's no secret that I'm a bit of a fan of romcoms and I discovered this little gem quite by accident recently;  there was the added bonus that this was a British film (lottery funded apparently).  There are a few well known names such as Bill Nighy, Brooke Shields and Bill Bailey to keep the face hunters happy, but there are a few less well known individuals there too.  

I hadn't discovered Felicity Jones before this movie, but she seemed to flit part of Kim nicely and may well be someone to watch out for in the future.  Come to think of it, there's always a danger of looking for someone you have discovered doing the same type of film again and playing a similar role when in reality, most actors and actresses aspire to be more dynamic and fear being typecast.  Talking of which, whenever I see Bill Nighy on screen the first thing that pops into my head is that song "I feel it in my fingers..." from Love Actually.  This is another one of my all time favourite British films that gets watched on a regular basis.

Chalet girl is a story about a young girl (Kim) who's stuck in a dead end job in a fast food joint, and she spends a lot of time looking after her dad, who can arguably fend for himself anyway.  Kim seizes the opportunity of a chalet catering job in the alps looking after a number of wealthy guests.  The job comes with benefits in that work is sporadic and there is plenty of free time to enjoy the thrills and spills on the slopes. 

Kim discovers snowboarding during a period of downtime and being an ex-skateboarder she takes to it naturally and soon begins to turn heads.  When she learns of an end of season snowboarding competition with a generous amount of prize money she decides to stand up to the challenge, but can she get past the effects of a trauma in her early teens which have so far prevented aspirations from taking off.  To make matters more complicated there's the mutual attraction with her wealthy handsome boss who has an apparently superfluous fiancee in tow. 

This all makes for a very slightly predictable but never the less charming and entertaining story with plenty of funny and touching moments to keep everyone happy.  If you're looking for something easy to watch and plain good fun then this is a film I can wholeheartedly recommend.

By the way, the extent of my knowledge of snowboarding can be summed up on the reverse side of a bus ticket, but that does not mean that it's something that doesn't interest me and it in no way thwarted my enjoyment.  Actually, snowboarding is one of those things that I have on my bucket list.  One day... when I'm rich...

"Think about the run, only the run.  Be the board...." - a quote from the film when Mikki "single guy from Finland" is mentoring Kim "not interested from England" on snowboarding.

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