Thursday, December 7, 2023

Classic Film Night - Miracle on 34th Street

 


Miracle on 34th Street is a Christmas comedy-drama movie. It was produced and distributed by 20th Century Fox. Miracle on 34th Street is written by George Seaton and Valentine Davies and directed by George Seaton.





The story is after filling in for a drunken employee for Thanksgiving parade, a man named Kris Kringle dresses up as Santa Claus and soon becomes very popular. But with his insistence that he's the real St. Nick, his mental health is soon called into question.








My Thoughts

One praise to give the movie is it's very realistic. While I do love the goofy Christmas comedies such as Christmas Vacation or the more magical specials such as Frosty the Snowman, it was a nice change to watch a Christmas film that didn't have that stuff. It's just a nicely done grounded Christmas flick.



Now I mentioned comedy previously. Despite the realistic take the movie goes with, there's still plenty of hilarious moments throughout. Two of them being a guy getting his wife absolutely hammered only by the end of it to be pointless, and a scene where a kid has to be called to the stand during court, which was hysterical. I could go into more details about those scenes, but it's best to see them for yourself.



The movie has a great cast, but the one actor who completely stole the show, was Edmund Gwenn. The guy killed it this role. There actually came a point where you almost wish he was the true Santa Claus. A matter of fact, he was so convincing in the role, his fellow cast members thought he actually was indeed Santa Claus. Let me reiterate, he was so convincing, that the cast actually thought he was the genuine article. If that doesn't convince you how talented he was, then immediately stop reading this, and go watch the movie.



The last thing I'll praise is the story itself. There's great messages about faith, with the running quote being "Faith is believing things when common sense tells you not to." Now a lot of you most likely think that's pretty sappy, but come folks, when you get down to it, Christmas itself can be described as sappy. But ignoring that, how many of you put faith into something as suppose to common sense? You wanted to be hopeful as suppose to being realistic. Besides that message, there's also a very relevant topic about how Christmas has become too commercialized. That only thing that people care about is the presents and not family. Sure, that's pretty much the message with Christmas movie or TV special, to the point of being an overused cliché, but I found this movie executed that far better, mainly because it was beating you over the head.








Guys, Miracle on 34th Street is a essential Christmas movie to watch. While I do enjoy my doses of Home Alone, A Christmas Story, How the Grinch Stole Christmas (both the original tv special and live-action movie), and etc. This is also a film I look forward to every holiday season. Hell, we should open up the season with this movie before the ones I mentioned previously.








My final rating is, A Must Watch.








That's all for now. Come back on Saturday, Dec 9th, for my review of Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever. Until then, enjoy the rest of your day.

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