.......and then there are the movies in which Christmas seems to make a glancing, cameo appearance...it's not there to do much for the movie....it's just there. And it makes the movie a tad more colorful, what with the blinking lights and the caroling and all. Here's a few odd selections BQ came across and we continued our eclectic viewing through vintage movie-land....
BELL BOOK AND CANDLE (1958) I can't help but love the idea of a romantic comedy about modern day witchcraft in New York starting out with "Jingle Bells" on its soundtrack. Yep it's the holiday season, the quaintly replicated Manhattan streets have a light dusting of fluffy movie-studio snow. And once again, 'Vertigo' romantic sparks, this time played for comic effect, strike up between aw-shucks-y, stammering James Stewart and ethereal, otherworldly blonde Kim Novak. Christmas gets dispensed with early on as Novak applies her something-wiccan-this-way-comes charms on Stewart, and the rest of it is a smooth, bubbly concoction that we don't mind watching again. We cast 3 broomsticks upon it.....
ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE (1969) stands staunchly out by itself in the James Bond catalog for featuring the one-shot Bond George Lazenby paired up with the karate-chopping goddess now addressed as Dame Diana Rigg. And wouldn't you know, it's Christmas Eve when George and Diana end up battling arch-fiend Blofeld (Telly Savalas) at his snowy mountaintop fortress. There's even an extra-gooey sugar-plum Christmas song, "Do You Know How Christmas Trees Are Made?" sung by someone billed only as Nina along with a chorus of warbling kiddies. And gift giving too....Blofeld, warming to the holiday spirit, spreads the joy amongst his cadre of deeply hypnotized voluptuous international babes. Each hottie receives a prettily wrapped perfume atomizer to spread crop-killing bacteria around the world. Merry Christmas and to all a good night! We gift it 4 1/2 stars.....
1941 (1979) Steven Spielberg's notorious all-star disaster of course hurls Christmas into the mix (along with multiple kitchen sinks) since it deals with one night of supposed comic hysteria in Los Angeles following the Pearl Harbor attack. Along the way Japanese sailors disguise themselves as Christmas trees, holiday shoppers riot at a department store, giant plastic Santas topple as fighter planes dive and swoop amidst the Hollywood Boulevard decorative lights.... and the application of a Christmas wreath sends a house sliding off a cliff, reducing it to splinters. Joy to the world. Until you endure it, '1941' remains indescribable....it's sort of Spielberg's own misbegotten version of "It's A Mad, Mad, Mad,Mad World" with comedians screaming at each other in the midst of spectacular special effects. As you might imagine, Spielberg's film is a resplendent visual wonder compared to Stanley Kramer's 'Mad World'.....after all, Kramer barely knew which end of the camera to point at his actors. Therefore, for the holiday touches and loony scenes you won't see anywhere else (like a Ferris wheel rolling off a pier, a tank smashing through a paint factory) we'll gift '1941' with 2 & 1/2 gingerbread cookies.......
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