The Holly and the Ivy (1954)

I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

How sad is this?

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

We are used to family-problem plays, but this movie works up a problem where it seems none exists. Sisters Margaret Leighton and Celia Johnson (supposed to be 31 but really 44 and looking it) each have secrets they keep from their father, minister Ralph Richardson, because they are sure he wouldn't understand. Yet, from what we see, this is utterly ridiculous. Leighton says people are individuals, not types. Yet she (and her brother, a very young and rather dishy Denholm Elliott) keep shouting at the poor man that he can't be told the truth, not because, as she says, of "anything personal," but because he is a clergyman. But all clergymen are not alike. Indeed, Richardson never is shown to be anything but an old sweetie, very mild-mannered, thoughtful, and self-deprecating.Then there is what we can conjecture. In more than twenty years, haven't the three of them had more than enough contact with their father to know that he is neither a rigid moralist nor a hypocrite? Why do they just characterise him as "a parson" rather than the father they know and love.Not only is this very silly, but Celia Johnson's character is nothing like as sympathetic as it is intended. Her fiancé wants her to marry him and join him in South America, where he has to be for five years. Yet she firmly brushes off love, sex, children, and warm weather, saying that she must stay and look after daddy. And this a daddy who has nothing physically or mentally wrong with him and who plainly has the money to hire help. Not to mention that her mother has been dead barely six months--it shouldn't be long before all the unmarried women in the countryside will be batting their eyes at him!Yet a story so contrived and false is presented as tremendously heartwarming. Leighton is, as usual, divine, and the carols were nice, but that's about it.

A fine play in a 1950s screen version, wonderfully cast - Ralph Richardson is the parson who has bred a dysfunctional family (daughters Celia Johnson and Margaret Leighton, son Denholm Elliott).When the family comes together at Christmas, with the two maiden aunts - the holly and ivy represented in human form? - secrets tumble out, the family comes together, and peace and understanding comes to pass as it should in the festive season.Leighton's flighty daughter with the grief of a loss in the war hanging over her; Johnson's tired and emotionally drained woman in love (with John Gregson, about to emigrate for his work); Elliott's Army private bristling against authority at all levels - all these characterisations are spot-on.But the film belongs to Richardson - quietly watching and waiting for his moment in the sun, a long speech to his daughter - although he is saddled with a slightly odd accent.The Holly and the Ivy is a heartwarming fable of Christmas and should be much better known than it is - can we have a television showing this season?

Christmas movies seem to multiply like the commercial world's "Season's Greetings"--and most of them are just as hollow and pointless. This is an exception, British cinema at its best. "The Holly and the Ivy" is an emotional roller coaster that leaves you wanting more.Members of a family assemble to celebrate Christmas in the home of their father, a widowed Anglican clergyman. Various ones have gone through painful experiences of one kind or another. And all have concealed the details from their father on the assumption that he wouldn't understand "because he's a parson." The shattering explosions that occur as bits of the truth begin to be revealed are memorable. Forget about the endless fantasies, flying reindeer and dancing snowmen. This is a real Christmas about real people. The resolution at the end may come a little too quickly, but it is satisfying. See this movie if you can find it--and urge the powers that be to re-issue it on DVD.

This movie is a little gem for the most part. And a welcome change from the usual Christmas fare. The only fault is with the ending which appears rushed and we are left to grieve the characters a little. Rather like a dessert that gets whisked away before one is quite finished. Unsatisfied. It tells the story of a widowed parson and the family members who come home for the holidays to a quaint old village. Father, played wonderfully by Ralph Richardson, has always been shielded from the facts of life by his three - now adult - children. For the era in which it was made (1952)the secrets one of the three carries is quite a shocker. A flaw is that Celia Johnson, an actress I enjoy, is far too old in this to play a thirty one year old. Margaret Leighton's brittle charm is never more appealing than here. However, the two aunts steal every scene in which they appear, two wonderful stage actresses, Margaret Halstan and Maureen Delaney. A great script, a little stagey, and ending far too swiftly, I gave it a 7 out of 10.