I saw Christmas decorations in a storefront Sunday, so I guess it’s already time to break out the holiday movies. And it’s evidently time for distributors to release holiday fare to theaters, even if Desplechin’s A Christmas Tale (Un conte de Noël), which hits theaters this Friday, isn’t exactly the latest crowd-pleasing installment of the Santa Clausefranchise. In fact, with such ingredients as estrangement, mental illness, alcoholism and cancer, it doesn’t seem like a very happy holidays kind of film. Even if it is actually a comedy.
But then how many holiday movies are completely void of depressing themes and scenes? I’m sure to have grown up thinking more about the homeless, suicide and family dysfunction from films set at Christmas and Thanksgiving than I did thinking about the happiness that comes with these holidays. One of the most tearjerking moments for me as a kid was certainly seeing Mickey Mouse crying over his dead son in Mickey’s Christmas Carol. It’s no wonder so many people get sad this time of year. Movies are influential, and for every bit of slapstick we see this season, there’s potentially room for thoughts of abandoned children to go along with it.
Worse for our tearducts are the films that aren’t necessarily thought of as “holiday movies,” which are typically more honest about how much of a bummer holidays can truly be. So get out your hanky and check out our list of ten most depressing holidays in movies:
I’ve just discovered that a slap in the face is the funniest thing in the world. Well, maybe not to me. But apparently to a lot of people much younger than me, a slap is a sure guarantee for a big laugh, particularly if the act is man to man or man to woman.
Yesterday I’m at the class I’m taking on Billy Wilder, and I’m really enjoying The Apartment, which is already one of my favorite films of all time. The rest of the students, aged mostly 18-25, are also really enjoying it. After all, it is a timelessly hilarious film. But then, of course, comes the scene where Baxter (Jack Lemmon) finds Miss Kubelik (Shirley MacLaine) unconscious in his bed, barely alive after a suicide attempt. It’s a moment that certainly interrupts the comedy, and although some of the stuff that follows, between Baxter, his take-home barfly (Hope Holiday) and his next-door-neighbor doctor (Jack Kruschen), is occasionally funny, the situation overall is pretty serious. Especially the part where the doctor is attempting to revive Miss Kubelik with coffee, questions, smelling salts and some slaps across the face. The students I’m watching the film with, however, think those slaps are the most side-splitting thing they’ve ever seen.
Oh, look: it’s my favorite New Year’s Eve scene of all time. Consider this a spoiler alert: if you haven’t seen Billy Wilder’s The Apartment…um, you’re missing out on a fundamental life experience, and you need to watch it immediately. To the rest of you: many happy returns of the new year. We’ll be posting lightly on Monday, and will be back in full-force on Wednesday, January 2nd.
We’ve had a bit of trouble getting this episode to go through the iTunes feed, so we hope this re-post will fix the problem. The original post, with episode description and embedded player, is here.
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