Holiday Affair

Janet Leigh, playing a young war widow with a small child, meets Robert Mitchum in a department store - where he contributes to her losing her job. From then on he's on the chase to get Leigh away from her nice but boring boyfriend (played with a bit more life than usual by Wendell Corey).

Through this admittedly thin plot, there are lots of opportunities for Mitchum to be both charming and irritating, and long before the end you can see where Leigh is going to be by the end. But as a Christmas movie, with the atmosphere and the sheer class of Mitchum and Leigh, this really is a pearl and not to be missed.

This really is a nice, little Christmas movie that gets very little airplay. Still waiting for it to make it to DVD. No big musical numbers or production standards, just a simple story about a young widow (Janet Leigh) and her son and how their lives turn upside down once Christmas season when a rather aimless drifter (Robert Mitchum) enters the picture. Some very good supporting actors throughout. Skip the remake. It does play from time to time (Turner Classics), so if you get a chance, watch it...don't expect that much, just a warm little picture, like a nice hot cup of coffee on a cold winter night. With all the crap that has become annual Xmas "Classics"...this one is just patiently sitting on the shelves...waiting. It really deserves it.

After accidentally discovering this film on one or another classic film network's graveyard shift holiday schedule, I've often wondered why it is not more prominently featured. The film blends some time honored themes of Christmas (the suspense and longing children feel at Christmastime, for example) with more complex undertones involving Janet Leigh's character, Connie. You see, Connie needs to decide whether she asked Santa for the safe and familiar toy (Wendell Corey) or the complicated model shipped without directions that may be a whole lot more interesting (Robert Mitchum). Leigh's wistful performance as a war widow struggling with needing to begin life again while trying to preserve the memory of her husband rings true. This is a great little holiday film and is now shown every Christmas at my house, just in case it gets relegated again to the no-show lists on air. Mitchum's performance is effortless and he seems to be enjoying himself-you will, too.

'Holiday Affair' is a truly wonderful film centered around a woman who's husband died in WWII living alone with her son, played by Janet Leigh (the woman that is) and a dreaming drifter played by Robert Mitchum. They meet and after a few shakes and bruises along the way, on both sides, in the end get and stay together. A then 20-year old Janet Leigh plays her insecure, scared and mourning Connie Ennis with a subtlety and a maturity beyond her years. And film-noir icon rough, tough and brooding Robert Mitchum pulls the role of the lucid and warmhearted drifter off as effortlessly as he did his Jeff Bailey in 'Out of the Past'. The man was a genius. The story as well is told with such maturity and wit for those days, when one considers all the sleek and easy traps of sentimentality and mushiness one could have fallen into in making these kinds of films. 'It's a Wonderful Life' has not been as fortunate. Another reason why this film has aged so infinitely well, is the well-drawn, 3-dimensional characters. As opposed to, again, 'It's a Wonderful Life', where some of the characters almost fade into caricature. Here we see REAL people as it were. Real people with real problems. Especially in Leigh's character, such as getting over the loss someone dear to us and how to move on and not be scared after that. But also in Wendell Corey's character. A man in love who knows she's not in love with him and who tries to hang on at any cost. But he's not depicted as a jealous, malevolent, crazed Iago-type character who does everything and anything to prevent her and Mitchum from coming together, nor does he play an overly-good, almost idioticly noble character who "just wants her to be happy" and who therefore gives her up. No, he plays a reasonable, slightly torn up man who sees the end is nigh for him and her, who's willing to fight but when he sees the battle is lost gives up graciously, a predicament which the otherwise somewhat wooden Corey conveys onto the screen wonderfully well. This, plus the little boy who for a child-actor performs amazingly well and the fantastic, almost over the top (but not really) ending, might make this into the best Christmas-movie ever made. Yes, EVER made! Leave not this film unseen! 10/10.

Christmas is six months away from now, but I felt to comment on this film now. Holiday Affair is one of the best holiday films out there. Janet Leigh and Robert Mitchum are perfect as the widow and unemployed store clerk, plus the boy who plays Leigh's son performance in the picture is excellent. This film shows the true spirit of Christmas during the holidays. A film not to pass up during any time of the year especially on Christmas.