Welcome, one and all, to Year 12 of A MarkInTexas Made-For-TV Christmas. Every year I think I'm finally going to run out of specials to review and every year I find that I have more options than I have slots. To be fair, the well does appear to be starting to run dry on variety specials from performers I haven't covered before as well as live-action narrative specials. But that's another concern for another year.
Back in 2020, I reviewed two specials from Hanna-Barbera, the legendary animation studio that brought the world, among other creations, The Flintstones, Scooby-Doo, and Yogi Bear, both made in 1972. One, The Thanksgiving That Almost Wasn't, aped the typical storytelling style of Rankin-Bass, which had already established itself at the premiere producer of Christmas specials. The other, A Christmas Story (no relation the movie that came out 11 years later) played more like a pilot for a continuing series about the dog and mouse in the middle of the story. At the time, I thought those were the only two Hanna-Barbera holiday specials not to star characters from the studio's stables. As it turned out, I was wrong, as I had no idea until I watched Silent Night, Holy Night that it was indeed also a Hanna-Barbera production.
To be fair, this special was produced in Australia, with the voice cast primarily consisting of Australian TV actors of the time, so it's easy to see how this slipped under the radar as an HB production. It is very much not a typical HB production, either. There are no wacky animals, no mystery-solving teens, no rock bands. Instead, it is a realistic, if highly fictionalized, take on how the famous carol came to be written.
Taking place in a small mountain town in Austria, presumably in 1818, Silent Night, Holy Night focuses on the potential catastrophe about to affect the town--the church organ is malfunctioning. That's a serious issue as every year, the town holds a widely-attended Christmas concert on Christmas Eve, and people come from all over to see it. No organ means no concert, and as the town's burgermeister so bluntly puts it, no money from the visitors (it was definitely a bold decision to have a burgermeister be the closest thing to a human villain at a time with Santa Claus is Comin' to Town was still running annually on American network television, but perhaps the special hadn't reached Australia yet). Seeing no other choice, the church's organist, Franz Gruber, goes to Salzburg to get a replacement part with his two young sons, even though the weather is turning treacherous. Some mild peril involving Gruber and his sons ensues, but since its not that kind of special, there's no doubt everyone will make it back safe and sound, but without the critically needed part. That's when, at least according to the special, the town's priest, Joseph Mohr, in a flash of inspiration, wrote the lyrics, and Gruber, who had never composed before, wrote the music for a brand new song in time for the concert the next night.
Gruber was indeed an organist and Mohr was indeed a priest, and the church organ was indeed damaged (by a flood, rather than mice as the special suggests), but most of the rest of how the song came to be is made up out of whole cloth (Mohr had apparently written the poem years earlier, and while Gruber did have two sons, both were born after the song's debut).
Its easy to understand why Hanna-Barbera's involvement wasn't widely advertised. While it might have given the special a higher profile, it definitely would have led to expectations that the special would be very different than the one we got. If only it was a better production.
To be fair, it's not a bad 25 minutes, if you can get past the rather crude animation (though it was fairly typical of TV animation of the era). It's just not particuarly exciting. The circumstances of the story dictate the outcome, meaning there's not much suspence in whether or not Gruber and the kids can make it back safely. Also, if the weather is as trecherous as it seems, just how are all these visitors coming in for the concert going to get there? Of course, leaps of logic like that occur in much fictional work.
This had a few runs in syndication in the late 70s before fading into obscurity, though luckily it did get a VHS release in 1984. Silent Night, Holy Night isn't a great special, but it is an interesting change of pace for a studio that usually dealt with much more frenetic action, and is an OK, if historically inaccurate, half-hour.
Next time: Another special from another land down under.
No comments:
Post a Comment