With Christmas falling on a Saturday this year, there’s one last full week — well, almost — before St. Nick makes his annual rounds.
Thanks to television, DVD and Blu-ray, there also are chances to give yourself some extra holiday cheer with movies that invoke the yuletide. Here’s a look at some of our favorites, those that are very traditional in their use of the holidays … and others, not as much.
Traditional:
White Christmas (1954), Jay Bobbin: A sure sign of the season, this enduring delight — reutilizing elements of the earlier Holiday Inn, including Irving Berlin music — guarantees warm feelings as soon as the title tune’s first notes sound over the opening credits. Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye are teamed memorably as ex-soldiers, now a successful song-and-dance team. It gets multiple Christmas Eve showings on AMC.
Miracle on 34th Street (1947), Kate O’Hare: This film dangles the proposition that Santa is not just a nice man in a red suit and then provides a surprising legal resolution. Customers love Macy’s store Santa Kriss Kringle (Edmund Gwenn), but his calm assertion that he’s the real thing gets him accused of insanity. His unlikely defender is a stubbornly rational little girl (Natalie Wood) whose divorced mom (Maureen O’Hara) has banned all fantasy. With a little help from the U.S. Postal Service and some deductive reasoning, Kringle — along with love, faith and imagination — is vindicated.
Nontraditional:
Love Actually (2003), Jay Bobbin: Directing one of his scripts for the first time, Richard Curtis (Notting Hill) infuses the many plots of his something-for-everyone romantic comedy-drama with the holiday season from the start, as a washed-up rock star (the superb Bill Nighy) has trouble converting the Troggs’ pop standard “Love Is All Around” into a Christmas-oriented version. Lifetime will run the picture twice on Christmas Eve.
The Ref (1994), John Crook: I like to pull this one out when I reach that inevitable point where my holiday goodwill is at its lowest. This acidly funny, grandly acted yarn about a harried burglar (Denis Leary) who is forced to take a bickering couple (Judy Davis, Kevin Spacey) hostage on Christmas Eve just gets funnier every time I see it. A few sips of this improbable mix of eggnog and bitters — lots and lots of bitters — can lift the fa-la-la-la-lousiest funk for me.
Meet John Doe (1941), Jacqueline Cutler: This stars the honorable Gary Cooper as Doe and Barbara Stanwyck as the wisecracking newspaperwoman. Furious that she’s laid off, she fakes a letter, signing it “John Doe.” Doe’s so disgusted by the country’s political climate he threatens to commit suicide on Christmas Eve. The paper publishes the letter, inadvertently igniting a movement. To cover the fakery, they hire Doe, whose conscience saves the day.
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© 20th Century Fox. Courtesy of AMC