White Christmas (1954)

To me, this movie is perfection.

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties. It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

Michael Curtiz, the director of the famous "Casablanca", with Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, and many other films, different genres, Action, Adventure, Romance, Western. The man was very prolific and very inspired with his other films, but not with this "White Christmas". "The boys", Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye, are not funny, the girls are not beautiful, well, Vera-Ellen she is acceptable, but Rosemary Clooney looks like a man in a dress. Irving Berlin's music is usually beautiful but not in this one, where everything is annoying, banal, uninteresting, boring. The first feature in VistaVision is a waste of time.

Obviously it neither invented Christmas nor the Christmas show but it is kind of the definitive Christmas show. Anybody reading reviews of this movie, or writing them, needs more to do at work. Who doesn't know this one?! It's like baseball, you may not like it but you're familiar with it. Anyway, this is THE Christmas show. It has war, eye candy, dancing, fancy getups, great stars, wonderful music AND you'll laugh your way to being unhealthily underweight. Seriously, Vera-Ellen was so thin you could fold her up and ship her as a one-stamp letter. And keep in mind, this is from the 50's. It's not in black-and-white, it's just so white you could go snow blind watching it. Seriously, you can't judge this by today's social standards. It just won't hold up. Except, maybe, when they belt out a rousing rendition of ... "Happy Holidays"! Who knew Der Bingle was such a liberal? I watch this every year, of course.

White Christmas directed by Michael Curtiz, Unforgettable Hollywood director, the moments you watch the movie, it will bring attention to keep watching an amazing colorful picture and miser en scene. For the first time White Christmas had a challenged contiguous technicolor that made Gene Kelly's to dance in a very good style. Like wise other Curtiz work, White Christmas has a very good ending though the beginning was difficult to understanding. However, it's in studio movie recording but the connection from one scene to another is little bit difficult to understand. In the meantime, White Christmas is probably the greatest example of the classic Hollywood film. Shot entirely on Hollywood sets, using studio actors, directors, and writers. Finally, as Christmas remain to be celebrated every year, same as "White Christmas" have been watching every year to accomplish my seasons Christmas flavor.

This movie seems like a sort of excuse to give lots of singing and dancing opportunities to its various superstars, but underlying the merriment is a bit of pathos. It starts on a battlefield in Europe in the winter of 1944, and a soldier with a beautiful singing voice gently voices a prayer for a white Christmas that perhaps says more about the state of mind of the troops than any terrifyingly violent action film could say. The movie ends up being about finding love, self and some measure of contentment in the period after the war, and for that it packs more feeling than it first appears. For all of its clunky moments, it helps us find a meaningful Christmas.