Review of A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965) by Barbara W — 27 Dec 2012

It feels innapropriate to review a television special. I mean, I review films. Not Television. But I have too. Many memories made me do it. I have the out of print Peanuts Classic Out Of Print Charlie Brown Christmas VHS and I watch it every year. This... is the best special of all time. This is probably the best thing to do with TV ever. A Charlie Brown Christmas is a classic that must be seen by everyone. If you been living under a cave, then go look for it. If you don't know the story Ill tell you. Peanuts was a comic that made its debut in newspapers on September 1st 1950. It is a classic comic strip about a boy named Charlie Brown who has friends and a dog that hate him. The comics were classic, but some characters like Patty, Violet and Shermy were replaced with Peppermint Patty, Marcie and Franklin in the later comics and Pigpen and Rerun and Sally were added in later comics. Because the comics were so successful, Schultz got a bunch of kid actors and Bill Melendez to star in a special in 1965 that would change christmas specials forever. A Charlie Brown Christmas aired on December 9th 1965 with glowing critical acclaim and was a huge commercial success as millions of people watched it. The special begins as we see our favorite Peanut Characters skating. Then Charlie Brown tells Linus that he is incredibly depressed about Christmas time. Linus tells Charlie Brown to cheer up and they go skating. The glowing animation is one of the highlights of the special. But one of the best things in the special is what you hear. The Vince Guaraldi Trio did the soundtrack for the entire special as you hear such classics as Christmas Is Coming, O Tennanbaum, and of course, the instant classic, Linus And Lucy. Once you hear this song, You will be dancing like the peanuts characters. I have the soundtrack on Green Vinyl and the 2006 CD Reissue with Alternate Takes and I love the soundtrack so much. Its one of the best soundtracks of all time. Anyways, back to the story. We get to see the characters hatered for Charlie Brown. This is one of the most funniest things about the movie as you feel his sadness while laughing hard at it. Later on in the special, Lucy tells Charlie Brown to be the director of a Christmas Play that tells the birth of Jesus Christ. He agrees and walks away as we get to see the personality of Snoopy. Snoopy seems to always get what he wants which is quite interesting for this character. We find that some of the themes in this movie is about over commercialism and money. When Charlie Brown tries to direct the play, everyone doesn't listen to him. Instead they keep dancing to Linus and Lucy. There is one problem I had with the special and thats that they didn't get to add all of the soundtrack. The soundtrack is so big that featured classic's Greensleeves and My Little Drum which are some of the best songs on the soundtrack. Its too bad that they couldn't add any of those songs. But back to the special, because they are so commercial, the peanuts gang wants to make Charlie Brown get an illuminam tree. Linus comes with him to get it. But Charlie Brown wants to be traditional and gets a crappy old tree that is falling apart. They hate him for it and laugh at him. Charlie Brown yells out what it is the meaning of christmas as Linus tells everyone in the Greatest Scene in the Special. He tells them that its all about Jesus Christ, Good Spirit and Will. That is the greatest scene in a christmas special/movie ever. Even better then Its A Wonderful Life. The special ends with The peanuts gang making the old tree look great as they all sing Hark The Angel Sings. This special brings back so many memories from my childhood from directing the play, The soundtrack by the Vince Guaraldi Trio, The jokes, The overall message and everything about it is near perfection. A Charlie Brown Christmas is the defenition of a classic christmas movie/special.

99/100 A.