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Gurinder Chadha’s ‘Christmas Karma’ Opens in UK to Harsh Early Reviews

Chadha frames her Dickens reimagining as a secular, empathetic portrait of modern Britain shaped by migration and identity.

Overview

  • The film is now showing in UK cinemas, with outlets noting a Friday, November 14 release.
  • Early critical reaction has been largely negative, including a zero-star Telegraph notice and pans from The Guardian and Empire.
  • Reviewers fault the execution, citing weak songs, visible green-screen, janky CGI and out-of-sync vocals despite a well-intended concept.
  • Kunal Nayyar stars as Mr Sood, a British-Indian Scrooge figure whose backstory draws on the 1972 expulsion of South Asians from Uganda, with Eva Longoria, Billy Porter and Boy George as the three spirits.
  • The soundtrack, overseen by Nitin Sawhney, features original songs by Gary Barlow and Shaznay Lewis and includes Priyanka Chopra’s ‘Last Christmas (Desi Version),’ with the album released via Sony Masterworks.