Posted on 12/23/2017 9:59:53 PM PST by Oshkalaboomboom
It is a Fact of Life that black-and-white movies are superior to movies in color, and that’s true of Christmas movies in particular, too. It’s true even if you exclude the obvious and over-watched It’s a Wonderful Life and Miracle on 34th Street, and it’s especially true if you look at the hideous fare that usually makes lists of best Christmas movies, from National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation and Bad Santa to Die Hard.
So here are five black-and-white classics that embody the real Christmas themes of spiritual transformation and rebirth, and demonstrate once again why the best outdoor Christmas scenes are shot in black-and-white on a sound stage.
A Christmas Carol (1951). The best of all the film adaptations of Charles Dickens’s classic, this British version perfectly captures the dark, foggy world of Dickensian London and the rich spirit of his original. Scottish actor Alastair Sim gives one of the screen’s great performances as Ebeneezer Scrooge, revealing from the start the emotional vulnerability beneath the old miser’s cynical shell. Some scenes, especially at the end, are so touching they almost are beyond watching, but look for brief appearances by Sir Michael Hordern as Marley’s Ghost, Patrick Macnee (later John Steed in the original TV series The Avengers), Peter Bull (the Russian ambassador in Doctor Strangelove), and Hermione Baddeley (who later wound up being Bea Arthur’s maid in the TV series Maude). Warning: Steer clear of Hollywood’s 1938 film of the same name, which completely rewrites, and makes a travesty of, the Dickens story.
Christmas in Connecticut (1945). Barbara Stanwyck plays a successful journalist whose column is based on the lie that she’s a happy homemaker with a farm, husband, and child in rural Connecticut when in fact she is single, lives in Manhattan, and can’t boil water. Suddenly she has to turn fiction into reality in order to host a returning war hero for Christmas, and the farce is on. In the process she discovers love and the value of honesty over celebrity. As light and luminous as the staged farmhouse in which the action takes place, Christmas in Connecticut also serves up two familiar faces from Casablanca: Sydney Greenstreet as Stanwyck’s comically domineering publisher, and S. Z. (“Cuddles”) Sakall as the Hungarian restaurateur Stanwyck brings out to her make-believe farm to cook the recipes she’s passed off as her own.
The Cheaters. Another 1945 film about people pretending to be who they aren’t, but who learn the value of honesty and integrity at Christmas. This one stars longtime suave Hollywood heavy Joseph Schildkraut as a homeless and alcoholic ex-actor who gets taken in at Christmas by the dysfunctional Pigeon family (headed by bullfrog-voiced Eugene Palette and Billie Burke, the latter of whom played Glinda the Good Witch in The Wizard of Oz) so they can steal an inheritance. They all, including the ex-actor, wind up being transformed for the better.
The Bishop’s Wife (1947). Cary Grant is the omnicompetent urbane angel who’s come to Earth to save a bumbling bishop (David Niven) from his obsession with building a costly cathedral, which has alienated him from his friends, his parishioners, and his wife, played by Loretta Young in what I think is her single best role on film. The graceful performances by Grant, Niven, and Young, plus Monty Woolley as a bumptious professor of ancient history and Elsa Lanchester as the bishop’s mousy maid, raise what might have been a limp version of It’s A Wonderful Life to the level of cinematic art.
Meet John Doe (1941). No Christmas movie list is complete without a Frank Capra film, and in this one we again get the treat of Barbara Stanwyck as a dishonest journalist. This time she’s trying to save her job by penning a phony letter from someone claiming he’s going to commit suicide on Christmas Eve in order to protest the injustices in the world, and signing himself “John Doe.” When the letter causes a publicity sensation, she has to find a real John Doe and recruits a shy, out-of-work semi-pro ball player (Gary Cooper). The pair quickly become caught up in a national frenzy of John Doe Clubs, which turn out to be manipulated by a wealthy millionaire with dark political ambitions. As a penetrating commentary on American democracy, and an exploration of the possibilities as well as dangers of a runaway populism, the movie not only puts Capra’s earlier Mr. Smith Goes to Washington in the shade, but gives us an important film to watch in the era of Donald Trump as well as at Christmas. The final scene, where the main characters all reunite on a snow-covered Christmas Eve with their lives changed forever, is one of the most beautiful Capra ever filmed — and makes even the heart-warming last scene of It’s A Wonderful Life seem syrupy and sentimental, which is of course it is.
So celebrate December 25 by watching Die Hard for the umpteenth time, if you must. I’ll be dreaming of a black-and-white Christmas, with visions of Cary Grant, Alastair Sim, Sydney Greenstreet, and Barbara Stanwyck dancing in my head — and on the screen.
A classic!
Turns out that that today, Christmas Eve into early Christmas morning, four of the five will be on TCM....the51 Christmas Carol is not aired during that time period. It may later on in the day
Also showing are
The Man Who Came to Dinner
It Happened on Fifthe Avenue
Holiday Affair
The Bells of Sy. Mary’s
Pocketful of Miracles
I’ve seen four of five, The Cheaters is one I’ll have to look up.
I’d also add Holiday Inn to the list. It’s a flick that just picks you up, and it’s where “White Christmas” first made an appearance.
“We’re No Angels” with Humphrey Bogart.
My mom was so much a Loretta Young clone she was once asked for her autograph. Sadly, I did not inherit that particular gene!
Peter Ustinov, Leo G Carrol & Aldo Rey as well, fully agree! 1955 flick, ignore the others!
The Lemon Drop Kid with Bob Hope. Its where the song “Silver Bells” came from. Great little Xmas/comedy movie.
“The Crossing”
Washington crosses the Delaware and defeats the Hessians at Trenton and saves our Revolution.
Also, It's A Wonderful Life got rereleased theatrically. Good date movie for MrsEx and meself. Yes, we've seen it "a million times" on TV. Nothing like the big screen. I was picking out small details I had never seen before.
^This, too. It’s loads of fun.
Both are in my DVD Collection, along with the musical “Scrooge”.
There is one called The Story Lady my wife really likes.
It has Stephanie Zimbalist in it as well.
One version, I think it was the 1938 film, wasn’t bad but was totally ruined for me by having a Tiny Tim almost as large as his father. It was off-putting.
I loved The Bells of St. Mary’s. That’s a classic for sure.
In the modern world, this is a redundant statement.
Best “Christmas Carol” is the musical with Kelsey Grammer
Too late for me to catch most of these this year, but bookmarked for next year.
Sometimes Christmas movies come on at odd times during the year, and I record them to watch in December.
One of my favorite Christmas movies lately is It Happened On 5th Avenue.
Meet John Doe is the only one I haven’t seen.
I forgot Trump was in Home Alone 2.
There’s a 1940 film on Amazon Prime called Beyond Tomorrow (b&w) or Beyond Christmas (colorized). Not a great classic, but it gets the point of redemption over quite clearly at the very end.
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