Mainlining Christmas

I'm convinced this would have broken into the canon of Christmas classics were it not for one extremely racist line of dialogue about eleven minutes into the movie. And, to be clear, the line in question (delivered as both a joke and a character beat) is quite offensive. War or no war, the line was bad then and is certainly bad now. The irony is other than that one joke, the movie holds up remarkably well in virtually every respect. It's a comedic Christmas murder mystery in the vein of The Thin Man starring Deanna Durbin as a fan of the mystery genre who jumps at the chance to investigate a murder she partially witnesses from the window of a train. The tone is closer to that of an adventure comedy than a noir, though it occasionally borrows stylistic embellishments from the genre it's poking fun at. If you took my advice a few years ago and watched Mystery of the Wax Museum , this strikes an similar balance between homage and parody (Durbin's character is also reminis...

In the revised edition of "Christmas in the Movies," Jeremy Arnold includes a short chapter devoted to the phenomenon of classic noir set during the holidays. In it, he argues intrinsic aspects of noir prevent these from ever being true holiday movies. I couldn't disagree more with that conclusion, but I'm grateful for the chapter, as it's helped lead me to a number of movies not typically listed as Christmas media. The Reckless Moment, a 1949 film directed by Max Ophüls and starring Joan Bennett and James Mason, certainly isn't my favorite of the lot, but I'm still glad I watched it. My understanding is this is fairly well regarded - I'm guessing that's mainly due to a combination of the movie's point-of-view and the quality of the lead performances (Mason is particularly good here). But while I appreciate the movie's merits, I can't echo its fans. I found the bulk of the film a bit too grounded to be interesting, and its more dramatic...

The Preacher's Wife has been on our watch list for years, but it's one of those movies that never seems to land on streaming services, or at least not ones we're subscribed to. Eventually I broke down and ordered a DVD, which then sat in a pile beside my TV for months. There it remained until someone commented on our 10 year old review of The Bishop's Wife  politely calling us out for not getting to the remake. Guess what we watched that night.  My first observation watching it was that I was going to need to rewatch the original if I wanted to have anything more substantive to say than, "yeah, this one's really good, too." Fortunately, the 1947 film is a lot easier to watch online than the remake, which is why you're getting a hybrid article covering both versions. Looking at them together has the unusual effect of making both seem even better. The films start with the same underlying premise but approach it in such radically different ways they feel ...

Penny Serenade is one of those movies that eases into revealing its holiday credentials. I spent most of the first half thinking I'd been misled by whatever Christmas movie list I saw this on, but - sure enough - by the end I was convinced. More than that, the nature of its structure makes it particularly interesting to examine as a Christmas movie. As usual, I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's backup and get some context. If Penny Serenade were released now, it would probably be considered a dramedy, as it pointedly contains both tragedy and humor and its tone tends to revert to a midpoint between those extremes. It's mostly notable for being the first film to earn Cary Grant an Oscar nomination, though if you ask me, his costar, Irene Dunne, is the real MVP here. Don't get me wrong: Grant's great too, but I found Dunne's performance more believable and sympathetic (to be fair, the writing around her character also ages better, as we'll discuss in more d...

Alias Boston Blackie is the third installment of a fourteen film series (plus a radio show spin-off) based on a character serialized for magazines who'd previously been adapted into silent films prior to Columbia Pictures's relaunch in the '40s starring Chester Morris. Kind of makes you wonder how long it's going to take for the name, "James Bond," to elicit the same blank stare "Boston Blackie" does now. Or maybe you're better versed in early 20th century crime fiction than I am. Blackie started out a character in crime fiction, assuming Wikipedia can be trusted (I sure as hell don't have the time to track down and read a bunch of 100 year old stories to confirm that). By the time he made his way to Columbia, the character had been reformed, presumably to keep him on the good side of the Hays Code, which was pretty strict about active criminals being punished for their deeds before the end credits rolled. Put a pin in this, though - I was pl...

Describing Come to the Stable as a comedy doesn't quite convey the tone of this lighthearted, charming film about two nuns from a French convent traveling to the town of Bethlehem (the one in New England, mind you, not the famous one) on a mission to repay a debt to God by building a children's hospital. This thing is whimsical, with sensibilities more in line with a cartoon's than a straightforward comedy. Think a 40s take on Phineas and Ferb where the main characters are sisters instead of brothers, and where "sister" is an official designation. The Phineas and Ferb comparison is more apt than you'd think. For one thing, the nuns aren't really given strong character arcs of their own, but instead serve as catalysts for other characters' arcs. To be clear, this isn't a flaw: contrary to what a distressingly large number of internet commentators (as well as an even more distressingly large number of Hollywood producers) have come to believe, not ev...

Depending on how you want to define your terms, Destination Tokyo might be the earliest Christmas war movie, though this is absolutely one of those times the qualifiers have qualifiers. The 1927 silent film, Barbed Wire , at the very least includes a memorable Christmas sequence which thematically shapes the movie around it. Likewise, the 1936 science-fiction film, Things to Come , opens at Christmas and plays with the tonal dissonance between the holidays and war (something Destination Tokyo largely sidesteps). Neither of these feature the holidays centrally enough to unequivocally be considered Christmas movies, though I'd argue both are at least debatable. The 1939 animated short,  Peace on Earth , is a more clearcut case - this is absolutely a Christmas war story, though its brief runtime might disqualify it as a movie if the difference between "short" and "feature-length" matters to you. Destination Tokyo comes closer to a clear-cut case, but even this has ...

The Cheaters is the one of two movies featured in the revised edition of Jeremy Arnold's book, Christmas in the Movies, that I'd never seen, so I figured I'd better rectify the oversight. While I wasn't as smitten with the film as Arnold, there's no denying it's charming, largely thanks to the performances of Joseph Schildkraut (who also appears in the more famous The Shop Around the Corner), Billie Burke (Glinda, from The Wizard of Oz), and Eugene Pallette. That said, "charming" isn't the same as "satisfying." Palette plays James Pigeon, an upper-class businessman confronting money troubles who's just learned a distant relative has passed away about a week before Christmas. Said relative has left his sizable estate to an actress who he doesn't even know (he was a friend of the girl's mother). If said actress isn't identified within a week, the fortune will instead go to James. In an attempt to ensure this occurs, the fami...

I'm going to cut right to the spoiler warning, because Cover Up is a delightful Christmas mystery that fans of noir (and the era in general) deserve to experience without having the story, ending, or even tone spoiled. It's the sort of movie that leaves me confused as to why it's not already considered a classic. That's not to say it's perfect - aspects of the last act are a bit underwhelming - but it's extremely good, compelling, and unlike any other film from the era I've come across. And, like any good mystery, it's better seen without being familiar with the synopsis. You've been warned. For those left, in the first paragraph I recommended this for fans of noir, but I didn't outright identify it as such. Others have, and it certainly bears hallmarks of the pseudo-genre: black and white cinematography, heavy use of shadow, expressionist elements... you know the drill. But ultimately the film almost feels like an anti-noir, leaning more towards...