FILM (1947)

Miracle on 34th Street Maureen O'Hara, John Payne, Edmund Gwenn, Natalie Wood Director: George Seaton

Of the many Christmas-themed movies that have been made over the years, only a small number have really captured the spirit of the season - or at least what we would like the spirit of the season to be.

Pre-eminent among these are Frank Capra's It's A Wonderful Life, made in 1946 and starring James Stewart; Brian Desmond Hurst's Scrooge, made in 1951 and starring Alastair Sim; and Miracle on 34th Street.

All have spawned inferior remakes, and each has at some point been ill-advisedly colourised. Fortunately the films are still available in the original black-and-white versions on DVD.

In 1946, when shooting began for Miracle on 34th Street, 20th Century Fox had no idea that they had a classic, or even a hit, in the making.

Head of production Darryl F. Zanuck allocated director George Seaton a minimal budget in exchange for a promise to direct another movie that he felt had more box office potential - the now forgotten Chicken Every Sunday.

Maureen O'Hara - who starred along with John Payne, Edmund Gwenn and a seven-year-old Natalie Wood - knew better. Initially annoyed at having to rush back from Ireland to film scenes at the 1946 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, she almost turned it down, but changed her mind on reading the script. 'I knew the movie was going to be a hit,' she wrote in her 2004 autobiography 'Tis Herself, 'but I was not clairvoyant enough to foresee it becoming a classic.' That it unquestionably is, and in the US to this day it is re-aired on television frequently between Thanksgiving and Christmas, roughly the period over which its plot develops.