By john Blankenship
Faith is when you believe in things when common sense tells you not to.
You probably recognize this line from one of the famous Christmas movies.
The philosophy contained in the line quoted from the famed “Miracle on 34th Street” probably is the central idea of just about every holiday film made in Hollywood during the past 75 years.
Those films include a number of renditions of Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol,” in which the miserly ol’ Scrooge is visited by ghosts who attempt to bring about his release from spiritual bondage.
Scrooge becomes a believer in the spirit of Christmas and dines with the family of his employee Bob Cratchet, who is rich in family love though not materially wealthy.
The same motif appears in film after film of the mid-20th century, in which both the joy and the frustration of the Christmas season is treated in a variety of didactic themes.
“Miracle on 34th Street,” starring Roanoke-born John Payne, is one of two films depicting the essence of the Christmas spirit in America, the other being “It’s a Wonderful Life,” starring Jimmy Stewart.
Every year about this time, many American families watch these movies together. And if parents feel like kids again when they see them, perhaps it’s because the films echo their own childhood, about believing in the unbelievable, a virtue that is as timeless as the belief in Santa Claus.
Payne pressed 20th Century Fox to make the movie about a story by Valentine Davies published in a magazine. It was right after World War II, and the studio chiefs were more inclined to do lavish musicals than a simple little story about a department store Santa taken to court on lunacy charges because he believed he was the real thing.
The film has become a classic in that it gives audiences a chance to believe in miracles, something that Christmas is all about anyway.
The same goes for “It’s a Wonderful Life.”
Jimmy Stewart learns the value of friendship in small-town America after he bangs his head in an auto mishap on Christmas Eve. Like Scrooge of the Charles Dickens classic “A Christmas Carol,” Stewart finds the true meaning of Spirit — the embodiment of any Christmas holiday.
And though adults still cherish the universal ideals of faith and hope present in the classical holiday fare, the more modern films convey the same themes to children.
That’s why “A Christmas Story” tells a timeless tale about a youngster getting his first BB air rifle, a Daisy lever-action model, even though his mother warns from the kitchen, “No. You might shoot your eye out!”
The film certainly provides laugh after laugh, and brings back the fabulous ’50s, when no one seemed to have any money at all, let alone $12 to buy a shooting toy.
Seeing a youngster get his first BB gun will spark the imagination of nearly anyone over the age of 40. Waiting to see if Santa was going to come through with a Daisy Red Rider has to rank with the most suspenseful rites of passage for a cowboy — and maybe even for some cowgirls.
“It’s a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie” shows the heart and humor of a typical Kermit the Frog film. It’s basically a retelling of “It’s a Wonderful Life” with Kermit in the Jimmy Stewart role.
Kids still laugh when they see it. “Everyone Matters” sung by Kermit and friends is a sweet tune that’s still in our heads. And who can forget the “Muppets Christmas Carol,” a reworking of Dickens’ classic told with the charm and appeal of Jim Henson’s unforgettable characters?
Vintage Christmas films remain popular with parents and continue to pull at the heart strings, but children and adults both now can appreciate some good laughs in their holiday movie entertainment that still conveys an idea of hope, even believing in the seemingly unbelievable.
Of course, movies about good ol’ St. Nick are popular, too. Tim Allen’s modern classic “The Santa Clause,” along with its sequel, offers some creative answers to the timeless questions all children ask: “How can Santa get around the world so fast? How does he carry all those toys? Why has no one ever seen Santa’s workshop at the North Pole?”
And even, “How does the big fat man get down the chimney? What if someone doesn’t have a chimney?”
The important thing to remember about Christmas movies, whether they are the timeless classics or more modern fare, is that they give us the opportunity to escape from the burdens of the real world for just an hour or two, and they rekindle in each of us the idea of hope and the joy of believing.
-----
Top o’ the morning!
— Blankenship is a columnist for The Register-Herald.
E-mail: jabbb@suddenlink.net.
