Product: A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965)
Rating: 5.0
Charlie, Charles & Christmas... all you need!
Stop right here! This one is it! Purchase this & none other! 'Charlie Brown Christmas' has never looked & sounded better. This is all the 'stuff' that is Christmas, at least up through 1965. Winter snow, ice-skating, snow-ball throwing, Christmas list to Santa, the nativity play & a not-so-great yet real tree... &, of course, a real lengthy scriptural passage read by Linus! Now it wouldn't be Schulz if there weren't his characters' cynicism, materialistic concessions & rants! This is the first real collaboration for Schulz, Melendez, Mendleson & the great Vince Guaraldi (music). And it was all conceived & completed in 6-months!!! This unimaginable, limited amount of time actually worked in its success in that it looks nothing like Disney, Looney Toons &/or a pedestrian children's Saturday cartoon.Schulz insisted that the integrity & look of his strip be evident in every frame which allowed Melendez (an ex-Disney animator) to move the gang statically (much like how 'South Park' would look years later), complete w/asides & glaring close-ups... cheating, if you will, & yet establishing a sort of compromised 'strip-vs.-cartoon' hybrid. It gave it its look (which, by the way, lost its trademark style in the early '70's... ugh! What happened!?!)The other remarkable element are the voices themselves in that real children voices were used on the soundtrack. Here we have the best, most memorable voices in all the decades of this (or any other) animation. Christopher Shea (as Linus) & Peter Robbins (as Charlie Brown) are the only voices... the only...! Even sister Sally's voice is the best. In later installments the children sound like they're reading a script as hired professionals. on 'Christmas' they sound authentically conversational, witty, sarcastic & 'charlie-browny'!!! They all were really funny too! Just like real kids (w/adult minds!)Guaraldi's classic 'Linus & Lucy' is used effectively in the dance at the school auditorium, as is his gorgeous 'ChristmasTime Is Here' so perfect to open the skating Peanuts gang! Guaraldi is a genius with his remarkable use of jazz & melody on nearly all his Peanuts' scores. This one is particularly great, as sales of the CD soundtrack each & every year prove still sell so well (get the 2006 remaster!)Of course, the reading of the gospel of Luke is not only remarkable for that time, but in the decades after, it's so necessarily touching for this holiday! Only Linus can do this each & every year! Even though I'm agnostic it brings a warm feeling to me everytime I hear it... His lispy recitation is letter perfect & something only Charles Schulz can do through his signature cartoon character(s)! It brings every year to a special (& tearful) hault!The only 'Christmas' classic w/great schdicky animation & script... a pot-pourri of all things Christmas, never to be topped again (except 'Polar Express'!). This re-release also includes 'The Making of...' & it's exciting to learn & watch. The added special 'Christmas Time Again' really lacks the magic of the original '65 classic as do nearly all the others after the '60's. Only nostalgia & chuckles... good grief!We love you Charles Schulz... come back to us... & if you can't, at least we have this one-of-a-kind classic each & every year.