Christmas in July (1940)

What makes it different from others?

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Smart, sentimental Preston Sturges comedy about a man (Dick Powell) who mistakenly believes he won a slogan contest and goes on a spending spree, buying gifts for all of his friends and neighbors. While this isn't the most critically-praised Sturges film, it's certainly one of my favorites. Probably my second fave behind Sullivan's Travels. At 67 minutes it's short for an "A" picture, but not so short you feel like it is missing anything.It features a great cast, as most Sturges films do. Dick Powell and Ellen Drew are immensely likable leads. The supporting cast is full of top-notch comedic talent, many of whom were staples in Sturges films. Raymond Walburn, William Demarest, Ernest Truex, and Franklin Pangborn are all terrific. Sturges wrote and directed it and, if you're a fan of his work, you know this means a funny script and great characters. This is a classic, not just for Christmas, but for the whole year round. Everybody should see it at least once. And remember: If you can't sleep, it isn't the coffee. It's the bunk.

This early Preston Sturges satire suffers by comparison to his later films, but even if it never reaches the dizzy heights expected of a Sturges comedy it still presents an enjoyable (if at times too predictable) farce. The earthbound scenario offers none of the director's usual madcap flights of fancy, following an unlucky entrant in a marketing slogan contest (Dick Powell) who mistakenly believes himself the winner of a $25,000 grand prize. It's all the result of an innocent practical joke, but the gag backfires when everyone else, including the contest sponsor, believes it too. The unsuspecting Powell suddenly finds the world off his back and at his feet, and the consumer frenzy that follows shows glimpses of the classic Sturges brand of anarchy, sadly lacking from the rest of the film. Lots of running around and shouting at double-quick speed can't really camouflage the lack of belly laughs, but the cast works up plenty of enthusiasm, and the final image (look quick) is wonderful.

For his second film as a director, Preston Sturges was given a slightly bigger budget than he had with The Great McGinty. With that he went and hired a star, not too big a star mind you, but one who was looking for something decent to play and was quite at liberty.The star was Dick Powell who had finished his Warner Brothers contract and spent a year away from the movies. Though Christmas In July might have seen at first glance as silly as some of what he was trying to get away from, Powell did recognize the talent of Preston Sturges and signed for this one shot deal.Sturges chose to satire in Christmas In July, America's obsession with radio contests, a subject that later would be used for television in the James Stewart film, The Jackpot a decade later. Powell has thought of this clever jingle for Maxford Coffee, a play on words, 'if you can't sleep at night, it's not the coffee, it's the bunk' which he tries explaining to any number of people, to his girl friend Ellen Drew and to his co-workers where he toils at a dreary desk job.Co-workers Rod Cameron, Harry Rosenthal, and Adrian Morris decide a nice practical joke is in order and fake a telegram to Powell from Raymond Walburn, the head of Maxford Coffee, saying Powell's jingle won. Powell naturally goes giddy with the thought of $25,000.00 and does as the telegram directs, goes to Raymond Walburn who thinking his jingle committee has actually come up with a winner, cuts him a check.Powell is a very decent sort and thinks of a lot of people in his neighborhood whom he'd like to help and spends it on them. It's quite a letdown for all involved when it all turns out to be a hoax.Christmas In July like all really great comedy has its elements of pathos as well. This same scenario could easily have been the elements for great tragedy as well. Powell and Drew register the highs and lows of their characters very well.By now Preston Sturges had established his noted stock company of players, most of whom appear in Christmas In July. One of them, William Demarest proves the savior of the situation, an ironical savior to be sure when you see the film.Though Powell wanted to do drama and was not to get that chance until a few years later, Preston Sturges was definitely a step up from some of silly stuff Jack Warner had been casting him in. Powell showed he could handle screwball comedy with the best of them in Christmas In July.

Short and sweet, bright and breezy, but not without pith, this early Preston Sturges feature helped further establish his "wonder-kid" reputation in the early 40's before his great classics "Sullivan's Travels", "The Lady Eve" and my favourite "Hail The Conquering Hero".The simple premise of a hoax win in a national coffee-slogan competition for ordinary average nice-guy Powell is the springboard for a light morality tale along the lines of "he who does good has good things happen to them" - although not without the usual series of ups and downs, just as you'd expect.Of course nobody here is really bad, even the duped killjoy Mr, no make that Dr Maxford of the sponsoring coffee company or Mr Shindler of the too-trusting department store from whom Powell buys gifts for the whole neighbourhood on the strength of the phony winning telegram placed on his desk by his prankster work colleagues. Even when he finds out that his win is bogus, Powell can't get angry at the tricksters, so it's no real surprise that his homeliness, honesty and humility wins everyone over, including his feisty girl-friend, played by Ellen Drew, with the predictable twist in the last reel that Powell's slogan wins anyway.Powell is very likable in the lead, although Drew is a little too high-pitched in delivery for my taste as the film develops. There's the usual troop of madcap eccentrics which peoples almost every Sturges comedy, with some nice little cameos, I particularly liked the actor playing the deadpan cop, not above making some contemporary allusions to Hitler & Mussolini to stress a point.The dialogue of course is mile-a-minute vernacular and I got a kick out of Sturges' Dickensian word-play over triple-barrelled lawyer's names (along the lines of "Swindle Cookum and Robbem!"). Right from the start, we get the "screwball comedy" template of a poor Joe and his girl, dreaming of something bigger waiting for something extraordinary to happen, with Powell and Drew's extended night-time scene on their New York apartment roof-top, and succeeding entertaining scenes including Powell's reaction to "winning" the competition and best of all the frenetic crowd scene when Maxford tries to get his money back only to cop a batch of rotten fruit ("Don't throw the good stuff" admonishes one parent to a tomato-wielding youngster), it's all good clean fun and ends up happily ever after. And get a load of that "zoom" shot back into Maxford's office at the end - it certainly got me out of my chair, not the last time Sturges employed camera tricks of this type - remember the memorable stop-start sequence to "The Palm Beach Story". The movie celebrates community, the little guy who dreams of making it big and how to meet disaster with alacrity, in short a feel-good movie with a big heart, well worth an hour and four minutes of anyone's time.