Coming to the final days till Christmas I knew deep down that I needed to talk about another Christmas film that could be on the debate table on if or isn't a Holiday classic, though is officially 80 years old. Meet Me in St. Louis is one of the many movies that my parents checked out at the local library for movie nights with me and my brother and sister, furthermore this was one of my sister's all-time favorite's mainly because she was a huge fan of the Musical genre as well as a big fan of Judy Garland. Sadly, this was the second film of Judy Garland's that I only watched throughout my life hence the other film was The Wizard of Oz. This is probably another film society should take on the debate case and answer we should consider Meet Me in St. Louis in the Christmas movie genre.
"Meet Me in St. Louis" is a classic MGM romantic musical comedy that focuses on four sisters’ (one of whom is the nonpareil Judy Garland) on the cusp of the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair.
To answer the question of if this film is in fact a Christmas film, we should make some great examples as to why we should answer this question mainly because the film focuses on the Judy Garland's family through the course of four seasons of the year, for which to give you an example Act I is in the Summer time, Act II center's around Fall time following the third Act in the Christmas season, for which we end the film in Spring time so, how can we consider this movie to be a Christmas film? Well to give the film credit the film introduced us all the one of the many popular Christmas songs "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas", for which was sung by Judy Garland herself, and the song was in the process of making numerous changes for many reasons the song was considered too depressing. To give a great example the first draft of the lines "It may be your last/Next year we may be living in the past" became "Let your heart be light/Next year on our troubles will be out of sight", and in fact Garland version of "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" became popular among the United States troops serving World War II; her performance at the Hollywood Canteen brought many soldiers to tears. So, in all honesty that's a plus sight to consider this film in the Christmas movie genre. I will admit watching this film at times does leave my brain in a confused state, for which I'm not going to list all of them just a few great example of why is the father of the film (played by Leon Ames) has a huge stick up his a** like every time you see the guy he's either offended or just is literally chewing the entire house I mean you could probably see the bite marks all over the house even chewed the cabbage while having supper I mean sure the approach to his character is basically Mr. Smith wanting to give his family a honest and successful life and by the end of the movie he realizes that he's ruining has family happy life in St. Louis but still feels like he's being way to dramatic which coming from a man who has a sense of humor it really is funny to see. Though a series of conversations I still don't understand in one of the lines Ames says that "next week I'm going to play first base with the Baltimore Orioles, which really at times causes my brain to melt because at the time of this film’s release there was no such thing as the Baltimore Orioles and me being logic pondered in wouldn't he just say play first base for the St. Louis Cardinals? Through a series of conversations, I came to the realization that he was obviously mentioning the minor league team that Babe Ruth was playing for, before he went to the Red Sox. An interesting fun fact I learned (all thanks to Google) is that kids back in 1903, is that kids really did throw flour at people during Halloween night which really shows how we roll with the changes in terms of what is acceptable and what is not but most importantly if we did throw flour at people now they would all feel but hurt, because lets be fair and state that liberals are thieves of joy. As for Meet Me In St. Louis, I would most certainly consider this film to watch on any season or Holiday but most importantly watch this beloved classic on Christmas time for a lot of great reasons the film does leave audience with a Christmas miracle but most importantly if you’re looking for something else to watch on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, Meet Me In St. Louis is a great film to watch for its classic tale as well as Judy Garland doing what she does best, but most importantly it certainly a great refresher if you’re not feeling the mode of being reminded of your own dysfunctional family like Christmas Vacation or Home Alone and as for me my New Year’s resolution if going to go through a good portion of Judy Garlands past films.
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