ORIGINAL TITLEHoliday Affair
GENRERomantic comedy · Holiday
ABOUT THIS FILM
RUNTIME
90 min
Vibe
Golden-Ageromanticgentlepostwardepartment-storeNew-YorkwarmfamilyunderstatedChristmas
A war widow working as a comparison shopper accidentally gets department-store clerk Steve Mason fired; their attraction complicates her planned marriage while her young son longs for a toy train. Postwar romance where christmas consumer culture, widowhood, remarriage and a child's desire for family all intersect.
MOVIE NIGHT RANK
#71 of 100
Watch for
- Watch how the toy train becomes more than a plot device: it concentrates questions of money, parental responsibility and what a child imagines Christmas should provide.
- Compare Steve and Carl not as simple romantic opposites but as different ideas of postwar security—improvised warmth versus dependable stability.
- Notice how department-store work, comparison shopping and gift buying place the romance inside a distinctly consumer-era Christmas landscape.
- Janet Leigh’s war widow is never detached from economic reality; employment and single parenthood shape the romantic choices rather than merely supplying backstory.
Production notes
TCM lists Hartman as director/producer, Isobel Lennart as writer and Mitchum/Janet Leigh/Wendell Corey with a 90-minute runtime.
Trivia
- Hartman directed/produced
- TCM lists 90 minutes
- Mitchum and Leigh star
- RKO production
- TV helped later holiday reputation
Legacy
box-office disappointment that built a modest Christmas following through TV; BFI values Mitchum/Leigh chemistry and postwar warmth.