dual personalities

Tag: White Christmas

“Free thine own from Satan’s tyranny; From depths of hell Thy people save”

by chuckofish

Well I find myself here on Tuesday evening, again, pondering what tales to regale you with this week. You all know that my parents visited the happening town of Jeff City this weekend. I thought maybe I’d do a post about how life here is just like a Hallmark movie (minus the romance!) but then my mother STOLE MY BIT in Monday’s post.

I mean, I’ll forgive her, just this once.

Then I thought I’d write about how in lists of Top Christmas Movies, White Christmas is always treated like the lesser of the two when compared to Holiday Inn. Yes, both movies star Bing Crosby and both contain the song “White Christmas.” But other than that, they’re not terribly similar and White Christmas is undeniably the better option. It has Danny Kaye in yellow socks and all of Vera Ellen’s Edith Head costumes.

So I was going to provide some backup evidence for this but OF COURSE the New York Times now says I’ve reached my limit of free articles this month (is that like -1??) and thus I cannot include quotes from their original review from 1954 where the writer is basically like “Meh, it’s low-energy and feels like they are all phoning it in.” As if.

Favorite movie dress of all time.

Also, who can hear the music that goes with that gif?

In other news, this made me laugh.

And so did this:

To wrap up this little Yuletide Clambake of a post, one of the interesting things about going to a Presbyterian church after 35+ years as an Episcopalian, is learning the music. Some hymns are the same, some hymns are new, and some hymns are sung to different tunes. Recently, we sang “Come Thou Long Expected Jesus” but to the tune that Episcopalians sing “Love Divine”. I have to say, I really like it.

Here is my favorite Branson-based family bluegrass band, The Petersens, singing two Advent classics including the aforementioned with the new/old tune.

May your days be merry and bright

by chuckofish

Irving Berlin won an Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1942 for “White Christmas,” which had its film debut in Holiday Inn, performed as a duet by Bing Crosby and Marjorie Reynolds.

The song would, of course, feature in another Crosby film, the 1954 musical White Christmas, which became the highest-grossing film of 1954. (I did not know that!)

Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m going to watch all my Christmas movies this month, starting now. It’s not like we have anything else to do, right?

In some ways, you’re far superior to my cocker spaniel.

by chuckofish

Well, as they say, it’s the most wonderful time of the year. And that means: Christmas movies! This month I will be blogging about my favorites. First off: White Christmas (1954) directed by one of my favorites, Michael Curtiz, and starring the most wonderful cast ever, Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney, and Vera-Ellen, who had to be the model for the original Barbie Doll.

In this well-written, fast-paced musical film, a successful song-and-dance team become romantically involved with a sister act and team up to save the failing Vermont inn of their former commanding general. Sentimental and G-rated, it somehow never seems dated. This has to be because of the witty script and the stellar cast, not to mention the great tunes by Irving Berlin.

I have seen this movie every year since my family had a television and my sister (and dual personality) and I knew the whole Sister Act scene by heart and frequently regaled our family with our rendition.

When my husband and I bought our first VCR in 1986, the first video we bought was White Christmas. It was so great not to have to wait and see when it would be shown on TV–and no commercials! My kids loved it too and it was a big event and the start of the Christmas season to watch it all together. One year in elementary school daughter #1 wanted to be Betty Haynes for Halloween! (I talked her out of it.)

The movie even has a reference to Smith College (which both dual personalities attended).

Bob Wallace: You don’t expect me to get serious with the kind of characters you and Rita have been throwing at me, do you?
Phil Davis: Well, there have been some nice girls, too, you know.
Bob Wallace: Oh yeah, yeah. Like that nuclear scientist we just met out in the hall.
Phil Davis: All right, they didn’t go to college. They didn’t go to Smith.
Bob Wallace: Go to Smith? She couldn’t even spell it.

What could be better than that?

After the Advent Service of Lessons and Carols, White Christmas is truly the beginning of the Christmas season.