Silver-screen glamor oozes from this vestigially cloying but devilishly feel-good Hollywood fable about an angel, descending from heaven in the physical form of Cary Grant, is assigned by the Almighty to answer the prayer of an Episcopal bishop Henry Brougham (Niven), who is preoccupied with his imminent fund-raising of a cathedral which puts a strain on his family life.
The angel with the name Dudley, a choir-conducting, ice-skating, harp-thrumming omnipotent being, comes clean with a dubious Henry of his mission and poses as his new assistant, squires Henry’s neglected wife Julia (Young) to recollect her fondest memory, charms the entire household including the high-pitched housekeeper Matilda (Lanchester), Henry’s prim secretary Mildred (Haden), and the Brougham’s small daughter Debby (Grimes), also, convinces an atheist professor Wutheridge (Woolley) to finally knuckle down to write the history book he has been stalling ever since. Eventually, Dudley’s mission is not to build a cathedral, the fund can be wisely disbursed to a more exigent need of its time, but to set Henry’s derailed life back on track, right before the advert of Christmas.
But there is a hitch, predictably, Dudley develops a feeling for Julia, which raises the tension between him and Henry, who runs away with jealousy (no sagacious scribe to inject him with any scintilla of trust in his devoted wife), and it is all up to a virtuous Julia to pull the plug with a lachrymose face to adumbrate that Dudley’s feeling is not unrequited, but bound by a wife’s duty, however tempted, it is too sacrosanct for her to shuck that off, a moral lesson inculcated with a beguiling pretense of cinematic illusion.
While the three leads are deftly treading their designated paths with admirable expertise: Grant is particularly jaunty in Dudley’s backhanded magickal tricks with an understated poker-face, Young radiates incredible bonhomie and saintliness and Niven, taking everything with a pinch of salt, perfectly offsets Grant’s exuding charisma in his own sizzling pique, it is the witty special effects that mostly, gives the movie an endearing quality that weathers with the age and shifting ethos, a self-typing typewriter, a self-replenishing bottle of sherry and a fully-bedecked Christmas tree, it is indeed, small wonders that save the day in Henry Koster’s vintage heart-warmer ensconced as a go-to holiday classic with wholesome contentment.
referential entries: Henry Koster’s HARVEY (1950, 8.1/10); Alexander Hall’s HERE COMES MR. JORDAN (1941, 7.4/10); Frank Capra’s IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946, 8.3/10).
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