History Film / WhiteChristmas

[[quoteright:300:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/white_christmas_picture.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:300:"...and may all your Christmases be white."]]

* AFatherToHisMen: Waverly, and one of the songs is basically about his men's admiration for him.

->''We'll follow the old man wherever he wants to go\\

With the grandest son of a soldier of them all!''

Take Music/BingCrosby, Creator/DannyKaye, Creator/RosemaryClooney and Creator/VeraEllen, mix in a bunch of Creator/IrvingBerlin tunes, and throw in a light but solid plot to put them all together. That's more or less what this film is.

[[quoteright:320:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/white_christmas_picture.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:320:"And may all your Christmases be white"]]

The two male leads play Bob Wallace and Phil Davis respectively, a mid-level entertainer and a nobody who meet up as they fight in WorldWarTwo in the same unit. In the wake of an at-the-front Christmas show thrown as a farewell to their respected leader, General Waverly, Phil saves Bob's life, taking a minor injury in the process.

* WorldWarII: The movie opens there, and three of the main characters served. Plus, two of the remaining main characters are sisters of their old army buddy from the war.

* OutOfContextEavesdropping: Nosy housekeeper Emma has a habit of eavesdropping on phone conversations. She hears Ed Harrison (an Ed Sullivan expy) planning to bring General Waverly on his show, and immediately hangs up her phone receiver to tell the LoveInterest... and misses the hero (Creator/BingCrosby as Bob Wallace) rejecting this scheme.

* PimpedOutDress / SimpleYetOpulent: Several fancy dresses. Of course there are the holiday dresses, but there are also the blue lace dresses in the "Sisters" number, the white lace dress with removable skirt in the "Mandy" number, and the black dress with flared hem and OperaGloves for "Love, You Didn't Do Right By Me".

* KarmaHoudini: Emma overhears the exact wrong part of Bob's plan with Ed Harrison, and gossips to Betty that Wallace and Davis are going to make a profit on General Waverly's hard luck and humiliation. Betty is appalled, and [[IdiotPlot instead of confronting him and learning the truth]], spends much of the rest the movie being passive-aggressive and cold to the rest of the main cast, especially Bob, who, having shared a kiss with her the night before, is confused and hurt. When she learns that Bob's appearance on the show had no "angle" and was a sincere gift to the General, she immediately ''forgives Bob for something he never did'', instead of ''explaining her mistake and apologizing.'' Emma never gets called out, either.

** "If someone is pulling you out from under a falling wall, just spit straight into his eyes."
* KarmaHoudini: Emma overhears the exact wrong part of Bob's plan with Ed Harrison, and gossips to Betty that Wallace and Davis are going to make a profit on General Waverly's hard luck and humiliation. Betty is horrified, and instead of confronting him and learning the truth, spends much of the rest the movie being hostile and cold to the rest of the main cast, especially Bob, who, having shared a kiss with her the night before, is confused and hurt. When she learns that Bob's appearance on the show had no "angle" and was a sincere gift to the General, she immediately ''forgives Bob for something he never did'', instead of ''explaining her mistake and apologizing.'' Emma never gets called out, either.

* KarmaHoudini: Emma overhears the exact wrong part of Bob's plan with Ed Harrison, and gossips to Betty that Wallace and Davis are going to make a profit on General Waverly's hard luck and humiliation. Betty is horrified, and instead of confronting him and learning the truth, spends much of the rest the movie being hostile and cold to the rest of the main cast, especially Bob, who, after sharing a kiss with her, is confused and hurt. When she learns that Bob's appearance on the show had no "angle" and was a sincere gift to the General, she immediately ''forgives Bob for something he never did'', instead of ''explaining her mistake and apologizing.'' Emma never gets called out, either.

Phil -- himself a wannabe entertainer -- uses both Bob's gratitude and his guilt over the injury to convince him to try a partnership after the war. Despite Bob's initial misgivings, the pair not only work as a due, they become one of the biggest acts in the country, moving in ten years from club gigs to their own radio show and ultimately to writing and producing their own Broadway revues.

* {{Musical}}
* OnlyAFleshWound: Subverted. This is what Phil says after saving Bob. It really is just a flesh wound, but the former will never the let the latter forget it.

* TakeThat: The "Choreography" number is one big TakeThat against MarthaGraham and the Modern Dance movement of the time.

** Also, this movie isn't the TropeNamer -- that was ''HolidayInn''.

* SelfPlagiarism: Not at all uncommon in an Irving Berlin film (as his contracts mandated no music but his own in them), but taken to new heights here. Besides the wholesale recycling of numbers originally seen in ''HolidayInn'' as parts of Wallace and Davis' stage show, there are quotes or entire songs from a handful of other Berlin films. Additionally, the verse melody from ''Holiday Inn''[='=]s "Happy Holidays" is re-purposed as the bridge of "Counting Your Blessings".

* TitledAfterTheSong: Since the song "White Christmas" debuted in ''HolidayInn''

* HistoryMarchesOn: Crosby at one point mentions that it would be "impossible to find a Democrat in Vermont". Back in the day, Vermont was a GOP stronghold. This isn't the case now, due to shifting cultures and party changes.
** Betty mentions that Benny is in Alaska, "out of the country." Alaska would be made a US state 5 years later.

Take Music/BingCrosby, Creator/DannyKaye, Creator/RosemaryClooney and Creator/VeraEllen, mix in a bunch of Irving Berlin tunes, and throw in a light but solid plot to put them all together. That's more or less what this film is.

Take Music/BingCrosby, Creator/DannyKaye, Creator/RosemaryClooney, Creator/VeraEllen mix in a bunch of Irving Berlin tunes, and throw in a light but solid plot to put them all together. That's more or less what this film is.

The film may seem odd to some, especially how Danny Kaye's socially awkward character seems AmbiguouslyGay to some these days (he's more meant to be a big kid, as indicated by his voice cracking at awkward moments).

* MayDecemberRomance: Both Bob-Betty and Phil-Judy. Bob is clearly in his forties in 1954, and while Phil could conceivably be as young as the late twenties it's far more likely he's in his middle thirties (as Danny Kaye himself was at the time movie was filmed), since he has spent ten years as a civilian after being a soldier in World War II. Meanwhile Betty is no more than 25, and Judy is even younger.

* ShowgirlSkirt: Judy wears a detachable one in the "Mandy" number.
* SoundtrackDissonance: [[TearJerker Singing "White Christmas" in the middle of a destroyed town during WWII to a group of sad soldiers]]. Singing the same song while it's snowing... that was accidental, since the number was planned when snow wasn't falling.

* TakeThat: The "Choreography" number is one big TakeThat against MarthaGraham and the Modern Dance movement.

->''[[TrueCompanions We'll follow the old man wherever he wants to go\\

With the grandest son of a soldier of them all!]]''

Phil -- himself a wannabe entertainer -- uses both Bob's gratitude and his guilt over the injury to convince him to try a partnership after the war. Despite Bob's initial misgivings, the pair not only work, they become one of the biggest acts in the country, moving in ten years from club gigs to their own radio show and ultimately to writing and producing their own Broadway revue.

A few days before Christmas on tour in Florida with the show, they receive a letter from Benny Haynes, another soldier from their old army unit, asking them to look at his sisters' nightclub act. It later turns out one of the sisters faked the letter, and the other sister is shocked at the dishonesty. It works, though, and Wallace and Davis actually end up falling for the sisters (but not willing to admit it yet), and even follow them to their new gig in Vermont. There they see it's got a warm spell, and even though it's the beginning of winter it's 70 degrees and there's no snow in sight. The owner of the lodge hires them anyway, and he turns out to be the now-retired General Waverly.

Okay, that seems contrived, but that's not the point. Aside from the musical numbers, the film keeps a strong focus on both the growing relationships between the male and female leads, and just as strong a focus on how Waverly feels washed up after leaving the army, and how Wallace and Davis manage to lift his spirits on Christmas Eve.

* ThatRemindsMeOfASong: Used throughout the film, especially the "Ok, let's rehearse the next number for our big show!" variant.

* SpiritualSuccesor: To, of course, ''Film/HolidayInn''.