User Reviews

A young lieutenant, Charles (Dean Harens), on his way home to San Francisco on leave finds that his bride-to-be has married another, and on a stop-over in New Orleans meets nightclub torch singer slash prostitute Jackie (Deanna Durbin) who tells him the story of how she married the charming young Robert (Gene Kelly) and how he got sentenced to life imprisonment for murder.

Noir specialist Robert Siodmak makes the most of a slightly befuddled script that never comes anywhere near to explaining Kelly's psychopathy or, even more puzzling, the circumstances surrounding the murder, who was killed? and why? Anyway, Siodmak does a great job with very little, and you really enjoy the itsy-bitsy pieces of deft mise-en-scene, and the editing is always elegant. The actors are all wonderful, from Gale Sondergards' sphinx-like mother Monette and the devastatingly handsome and wide-eyed Dean Harens as the empathetic lieutenant, to the two leads.

Deanna Durbin, obviously very much the singing lark and golden egg with Universal, does a rare turn in a wholly dramatic part, and she is entirely convincing. She enters the scene in a slinking, sultry noir-fashion, singing 'Always' so all hearts must cry out, and she is always very much a woman. Gene Kelly is no less a wonder in this very early part of his as a psychopathic murderer, and even though he is ultimately left unexplained Kelly invests him with charm and ambiguity.

OK first...how funny to read these reviewers feeling cheated and misled because the movie with "Christmas" in the title doesn't have santa and egg nog and snow and jingle bells and holiday cheer. Not enough that a pivotal scene occurs at midnight mass during the gloomy homefront years of WWII...no, it must have mistletoe & holly if the word "Christmas" is in the title. (I wonder if they got mad when DINNER AT EIGHT actually ended without showing the dinner party...?) Good grief, let me dislodge my rolled-back eyeballs and move on.

For those with broader minds, this ultra-elusive little film noir is worth seeking out. There is something grave about seeing two sunny, legendary musical stars in such brooding circumstances, especially Deanna Durbin--world-weary and gorgeous as Jackie, who tells her sad tale (in two elaborate flashbacks) to a pilot on his holiday leave.

Durbin's musicals are an acquired taste, but this dramatic turn requires no suspension of disbelief--she's entirely plausible as the luckless prostitute who must sing for her supper. Clearly, we are no longer in THREE SMART GIRLS territory. When she first enters the film to sing "Spring Will Be A Little Late This Year", she is both poignant and bored to death, a combo I tend to love in my leading ladies (Dietrich, anyone?).

Kelly always seems self-conscious and over-rehearsed to me (this mommas-boy-psycho role might be a little out of his grasp), but OK, I'll buy his shift from smirking charmer to brooding villain, especially since he's terribly sexy when he emerges in the final reel with his 3-day beard.

I wouldn't call Christmas HOLIDAY a raging success--so much needs to be squeezed into this running time to make the finale ring true, and yet it still feels rather sleepy (I have similar issues with Siodmak's PHANTOM LADY). But its always these oddball, subversive products of the studio system that are most fascinating, so it needs to be seen (it has never made it to video in the US). Fans of noir will appreciate the relentlessly grim atmosphere, even if it doesn't have a Christmas tree.

Stylish Hollywood film noirs, particularly such that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations were really big in the 1940s to the late 1950s. However, I never thought for once, that a big time studio like Universal, at the time, would market one, during the holiday season, but surprisingly, they did in 1944 with 'Christmas Holiday'. Although, the movie directed by Robert Siodmak was a huge success at the box office at the time. It hasn't aged well, overtime with general audiences. Partially, because of the forgettable generic title of the picture, the little reference to the event, and the fact that this movie isn't your typical, feel good, family friendly Frank-Capraism, Christmas film. Another reason, why this film doesn't stand out, much, is because the Hays Codes at the time, rejected many of the risqué themes from the 1939's novel of the same name like prostitution, misandrist beliefs toward war & politics, and the physical abusive toward women. This cause the film's version to be so water down, that it barely mirrors, the novel by W. Somerset Maugham. It was not a faithful adaptation. It was a far cry from the original. Instead, of having an rich naive bourgeois Englishman painter meeting a beautiful Russian woman who has chosen a life of prostitution as penance for her husband's sinful act of murder in Paris, France, the film screenplay written by Herman Mankiewicz change it to a wartime, bitter, U.S. military officer, meeting a beautiful tragic depress, nightclub American lounge-singer, trying to escape from her in-prison, murderous husband & his family, while on layover in New Orleans, Louisiana. Even the melodrama flashbacks, are different from the book. Instead, of the woman losing everything, due to her husband's actions during the Russian Civil War (1917-1922), causing her to live in physical abusive, poverty, outside of her own country. The film has the nightclub singer, "Jackie" AKA Abigail Manette (Deanna Durbin), lose everything, due to her ex-husband, Southern aristocrat Robert Monette (Gene Kelly)'s gambling, resulting her to live, in a somewhat quiet, yet gentler life. While, Deanna Durbin was a fine actress, in portraying melancholy, both in her singing and acting. Her character's struggles are merely adequate, and not as strong as the novel. In the book, we can understand, more on why the woman would still love her partner & why she choose the life of the prostitute. She sees her ex-husband's murderous actions as acts of desperation to survive, much like, her selling her body, in order to feed herself. While, in the film, it makes little to no sense, why Abigail would still continue to love Robert. Nor get the idea, that singing the blues is just as rough as prison-like. In the end, most of her scenes, come across, as over-dramatic. As for Gene Kelly as Robert. It's an astonishing change from his typical inconsequential musical fare, as he gave a pretty good yet, ominously performance, as a man with something to hide, while also coming across as very charming. You really can't tell, if he has ulterior motives or not, at times. As for Dean Harens as Charlie Mason. His character by far, the weakest of the trio, as much of his bourgeois original character was butcher to generic, American all-around boy-scout stereotype. However, he does do a good job, on being on edge at times, especially, at the beginning, where he finds out that his love to be, marry somebody else. Still, I wish, the movie made more, use of him. He's pretty much, has little to do or say, when Abigail begins tells her story. Much of this, has to do with the awkward story structure of the film, which carry from the novel. In the novel, the flashbacks are needed, as they were showing a different settling and time. In truth, much of this story of the film, could easily be, told in the present day, as the past events, are not so different from the present. Don't get me wrong, I understand, why they went with the oddly place, story structure, as a way for Abigail to slowly fall in love with Robert in the end, after first, exposing the mysterious, then reminiscing with Charlie, but I really could do, without the multiple flashbacks. The reasons, why, are very clear. It's highly slow down the pace. Scenes like the church & concert, went a little long. Even, musical numbers sung by Durbin like "Spring Will Be a Little Late This Year' by musical artist, Frank Loesser and "Always" by composer, Irving Berlin kinda dragging a times. Much of this movie, could had been told better, eliminating the irrelevant. Nevertheless, the atmospherically low-key black and white visuals by cinematographer, Woody Bredell with classic music were great. The use of shadows and silhouettes, were also pretty impressive. However, I can't say, this movie is the best film noir, I have seen. In the end, while, it was insightful, and intriguing. It falls short of being quietly profound. It's mediocre, at best. It would had dig darker depths, but falls into routine. No wonder, why it doesn't stand out.

There are, I suppose, as many reasons for seeking out specific films as there are specific films, bearing in mind that one man's specific is another man's Huh! In my case I have other passions besides movies one of which is what used to be called Popular Song in the days when the only other categories were Classical Music or Country Music and I had long loved the gorgeous ballad Spring Will Be A Little Late This Year which I knew Frank Loesser had written for Christmas Holiday making that reason enough to search for the film (for the record my life is crammed with movies I've never seen that contain great Frank Loesser songs: College Swing (1938) Moments Like This; Some Like It Hot (no, not THAT one, the Bob Hope entry from 1938 with The Lady's In Love With You); Thanks For The Memory (1938) Two Sleepy People; Kiss The Boys Goodbye (1940) Sand In My Shoes; Seven Days Leave (1943) Can't Get Out Of This Mood; The Glass Key (1943) I Don't Want To Walk Without You; Happy Go Lucky (1943) Let's Get Lost; The Perils Of Pauline (1947) I Wish I Didn't Love You So; Neptune's Daughter (1949) Baby, It's Cold Outside; Red, Hot And Blue (1950) Where Are You, Now That I Need You. For good measure Loesser actually appeared in the latter as a piano player) and eventually I tracked it down and was disappointed to say the least. Now, thanks to my good friend in France, I actually own it and I'm still disappointed, not least with the travesty of the beautiful ballad which is stepped up to a Dixieland tempo and completely thrown away by Deanna Durbin. Apart from that director Siodmak seems to be having a bad air day all round. He proved himself time and again a master of noir and that very same year he would helm The Suspect, followed the next year by The Spiral Staircase but here, possibly hampered by a script from Mank's big brother Herman that plays fast and loose with Willie Maugham's novel, he is curiously inept. For one thing we waste a good reel and a half on something that is totally superfluous; a passing-out parade, a Dear John letter, a plane journey interrupted by bad weather that could all have been eliminated leaving us with the main story of Deanna Durbin's ill-starred marriage with Gene Kelly who, in addition to enjoying an all-but-spelt-out incestuous relationship with his mother, Gale Sondergaard, is also addicted to gambling and not above murder. Maugham's novel of pre-war Paris has been transposed to present-day New Orleans, a bordello has become a night club, a hooker a singer and ... well, you get the drift. Almost nothing works though Siodmak does his best, still, everyone's entitled to one mistake.

I've never really understood the fascination or the popularity of Deanna Durbin. I've seen a few of her films and she's just not much of an actress. I guess because in most she tries to be a comedienne and to me...it doesn't work. Not so in this case.

A solider is heading home to marry his girlfriend. Just before he leaves he gets a dear john letter saying she has married someone else. He thinks he can change things by going back early but weather conditions strand him in a small town near New Orleans. He ends up at a bar and then a "Cat House" where he meets a singer who's also one of the regulars at the place. He listens to her life story and it's a tragedy. She tells of her fast marriage to a nice guy gambler type but was really a go nowhere type to begin with. He ends up killing somebody and from there it's remembrances and tales of the past. Maybe his girlfriend marrying someone else doesn't pale in comparison to this girl's life.

They don't say it outright but basically Mrs. Durbin plays a prostitute who happens to sing in a Cat House. It's inferred slightly but it only enhances how down and out her life had become. I imagine this was a different type of role for Deanna Durbin so she took it. This is no comedy or uplifting tale. It's a down and out film about where life can take you after bad things happen.

I liked it for what it was. It's not perfect but it's entertaining and a load off to see Durbin do something other than bad comedies.

Between Deanna Durbin, Gene Kelly and Gale Sondergaard, the realm of talent is incredibly high. What is missing is a sensible structure, a fully believable script and enough motivation to make thus work. There are confusing starts and finishes, flashbacks out of sequence, and a blaze way of presenting the facts and characters. It starts off with characters unrelated to the three leading characters flying into a storm for the titled Christmas holiday, and it is there where the title and its relevance ends. Spring may have been a little late that year, to paraphrase the Frank Loesser song that Durbin sings, but the script and its sensibility never seemed to arrive.

The main plot involves Kelly meeting Durbin at a concert, their courtship and sudden marriage, and the twist that Kelly is a sociopathical killer. Sondergaard, as his loyal mother, initially praises Durbin for her seemingly indestructible strength (indicating that she knows that there's something horribly wrong with her son), but when Durbin disappoints her, only a slap across the face seems to be warranted. The scenes between Kelly and Sondergaard suggests a mother love that goes way beyond reality, while Kelly and Durbin totally lack any sort of heat to make their whirlwind romance believable.

Perhaps better to be viewed as a character study than as a plot oriented film, this is a disappointing film noir directed by one of the best (Robert Siodmark). One flashback within a convoluted narrative is plenty, but this takes it way overboard. Gladys George and Richard Whorf try to fit in to the bookends of the main story but the results are unsatisfactory. Hearing Durbin sing the Irving Berlin classic, "Always", is a nice touch, but ultimately, this is a Christmas holiday that ain't so merry.

...but fabulous! Deanna's a torch singer, and she looks all grown up and gorgeous, she doesn't sing opera in this. Gene's a murdering gambler with a Mother Complex. How can you miss with a Maugham story? You can't. And Gene's mother is played by the great actor Gale Sondergaard. This movie is underrated and ignored, but should be seen by more people. I have it on tape and watch it every year around the holidays, it's one of my favorites, but it has little to do with Christmas. If you're a Gene Kelly fan, you'll particularly enjoy watching him act, but not dance! One lovely scene concerns a soldier going to Midnight Mass with Deanna where she gets hysterical, crying. It's very memorable. I recommend.