The Holly and the Ivy

The Holly and the Ivy is a far cry from the usual Christmas story since it is more a family drama set during the Christmas season. It is a powerful story with excellent acting as the group gets together in a country village north of London in 1948.

The family made up of father, aunts, grown children and two male friends come together at the vicarage of the father, the parson in a local church. Ralph Richardson and Margaret Leighton, as father and daughter, have the key roles and are bolstered by a strong supporting cast, including Denholm Eliot and Celia Johnson.

During the evening and Christmas morning, family matters that had been ignored or kept secret, come to the fore. After a series of uncomfortable incidents and heart-to-heart talks, things change and everyone finds comfort and possibly a deeper purpose in this Christmas.

This is certainly a serious movie and totally entertaining. Unlike many of the fantasy films we see at Christmas, this offers a dose of reality. The sets are very plain as they were in most British dramas of that era but the acting is superb. It teaches the audience that Christmas and family difficulties are often played out together. In that sense, family Christmas gatherings may not be that different than they were 60 some years ago.

For a while there, in Canada - in the eighties and nineties, when the television landscape was forever expanding - I could be guaranteed of seeing this movie; there was always some new station looking for filler, particularly during the Christmas season. What a treat!

This movie is not just a great film about the real meaning of Christmas, it is also a relic of a period that is not so long ago in terms of years, but is eons away in terms of social convention, manners, etc.

Even better, although the film was made in a gentler, more genteel time, serious issues (illegitimacy, alcoholism, reckless self-sacrifice) are explored with depth. If this had been a lesser movie, it would have come off as something to be shown in a religion class, but the extremely talented cast runs with the story and helps create a film that is magical and meaningful.

I have a tape of this somewhere, and am always on the lookout for a DVD version. I only hope The Holly and the Ivy makes it to digital transfer soon, and is rediscovered as the Christmas classic that it is.

Until recently I had never heard of this little gem of British holiday sentiment. I heard someone call it the "Christmas movie for people who don't like Christmas movies" and the quest to find it was on.

This is the story of a Christmas in which the emotionally wounded family of a Church of England clergyman come home and attempt to have a happy holiday. What happens is not your typical happy tearjerker, nor is it a Christmas nightmare. Its a reasonably realistic, as much as films of the time could be in 75 minutes, look at a family of emotional cripples as they all try to put their lives back on track. The ending while hopeful is far from certain, so much so that I cursed the fact that it didn't go on another five or six hours, my sole complaint about the film.

A word of warning, don't abandon the film until you get to the end. I wasn't enraptured of the film for almost two thirds of its running time. I was interested in what was happening but I didn't know if I liked it, and then suddenly all of the pieces were in place and it became this charming atypical jewel of a movie.

Forget Its a Wonderful Life, watch this instead, its so much more real.

"The Holly and the Ivy" is a very good film...filled with some exceptional acting. However, before you watch it, you need to consider what content is in the movie. Sure, it's a Christmas film...but also one that easily could trigger your depression if you've been struggling with it. It also brings up things that are NOT fun and Christmassy....such as dead lovers and children. So think about seeing it before you do!!

The story is about Christmas and a group of people who are all returning to a small British town for the holiday and to spend it with the Parson (Ralph Richardson). Most of the people coming have secrets...things they SHOULD talk about with family but haven't for inexplicable reasons. In most cases, they don't bring it up with the Parson because they perceive that he'll be judgmental and a parson first...not a father. How all this plays out is marvelous...with some brilliant acting. My only complaint, and it's a minor one, is that the problems are all worked out so quickly and easily...perhaps a bit too much so. Adding a few minutes to show this process would have made the film even better. Still, the acting is magnificent and the story filled with a gritty realism otherwise. Well worth seeing.

This is a delightful movie--truly one of the best Christmas movies. And it is now available in video in the United Kingdom. Unfortunately, "The Holly and the Ivy" is still not available to those of us who live in the United States.