Christmas Eve (1947) coasts on its title and its setting on Christmas Eve to enter the hallowed sphere of yuletide movies, but it’s not very Christmas-y. The sentiment, what little there is of it, seems forced and we have to even wonder what the point is.
Ann Harding, fresh off her great role in It Happened on 5th Avenue (1947) has a very different role here as a much older, frail, wealthy dowager who is lonely and a bit eccentric. Her nephew, played by Reginald Denny, wants control of her finances. The judge will decide her competence, and perhaps even her moral value, on the contest if her three adopted sons will return home to visit her on Christmas Eve. We need to accept a lot of plot points on face value if we are to enjoy a movie, especially a Christmas movie, but this seems to stretch things not only beyond belief but beyond our ability to perhaps even enjoy the film.
She is most proud of the fact that her three adoptive sons
left home years ago to make their own way in the world and not sponge off her,
like Reginald Denny. Will they come home
if she bids them? She has had no contact
with them for years. That is the
suspense of the story, but we are taken down avenues of the men’s current
adventures that may make us doubt not only that they will make it home, but
that they are even worth seeing.
George Brent plays her son Michael, who is a playboy, bankrupt, and not above writing bad checks, and trying to marry heiresses on the strength of their family fortune. Regular gal Joan Blondell attaches herself to him like a barnacle and intends to drag him to the altar whether he likes it or not. She’s probably the only thing that can save him from himself.
George Raft plays her son Mario, who is a gangster, but we see he has his good points too, taking the rap years ago for a crime Reginald Denny committed, just for the old lady’s sake. His side story is the most interesting, an action-packed episode of fisticuffs with Nazis on a yacht off South America. It’s a risk for him to enter the U.S. with the feds after him, but anything for Mom.
Randolph Scott plays her son Jonathan, a rodeo cowboy who drinks quite a bit, and isn’t the sharpest blade in the drawer, but he proves to be a good guy, too, when he adopts (or runs off with) three baby girls and with luck, manages to entangle himself romantically with the lady officer incognito who is trying to break up a black-market baby adoption ring. His rash action makes Ann Harding an instant grandma, and she couldn’t be happier.
By the end of the film, the boys have made it back to Ann Harding’s mansion, and the judge lets her keep control of her finances, and Reginald Denny is in trouble. John Litel’s along as an FBI agent here to escort George Raft to prison, but he’s a good egg and they all have Christmas Eve dinner first.
They bow their heads to say grace, and then the fade-out. It’s a Christmas movie in spite it itself, but leaves us wondering, “What the heck was that?” You can believe in Santa Claus, but it’s harder to believe this.
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Jacqueline T. Lynch is the author of Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. and Movies in Our Time - Hollywood Mirrors and Mimics the Twentieth Century and Hollywood Fights Fascism and Christmas in Classic Films. TO JOIN HER READERS' GROUP - follow this link for a free book as a thank-you for joining.
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