AS always, the December film choice from Moviola is somewhat shorter than the rest of the year, with at least one perennial festive favourite popping up on a village hall screen somewhere.

This year, the old favourite is that 1946 classic, It’s A Wonderful Life, at Chard Guildhall, on Friday 13th December, produced and directed by Frank Capra, based on a short story, The Greatest Gift, by Philip Van Doren Stern, which itself was very loosely based on Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. (That’s what the film notes say – you might think that the inspiration is somewhat topsy-turvy when you read the story, as follows …)

James Stewart plays George Bailey, a man who has given up his personal dreams in order to help others in his community. On Christmas Eve he is contemplating killing himself and then his guardian angel, Clarence Odbody, intervenes, showing him all the lives he has touched and what the world would be like if he had not existed.

Although it was nominated for five Academy Awards, including Best Picture, It’s a Wonderful Life initially received mixed reviews and was unsuccessful at the box office. But after the copyright expired in 1974, when it entered the public domain, allowing it to be broadcast without licensing or royalty fees, it became a Christmas classic and is now considered to be one of the greatest films of all time and among the best Christmas films.

Another classic getting a Christmas outing ids My Fair Lady, released 60 years ago, but completely timeless with its Cecil Beaton designs. The stellar cast was headed by Audrey Hepburn as Eliza, Rex Harrison as Prof Higgins, Wil.frid Hyde-White as Colonel Pickering, Jeremy Brett as Freddy and Stanley Holloway as Alfared P Doolittle.

See this beautiful Lerner and Loewe musical on screen at Donhead St Mary hall on Thursday 12th December.

The other films being shown at Moviola venues during December are:
Wilding at Trent (near Sherborne), West Camel (Davis Hall) and Whitchurchh;
Swede Caroline at Hawkchurch, Kingsbury Episcopi, Odcombe, Pewsey, Winsford, East Knoyle, Shepton Montague, Hanging Langford, Norton St Philip, Cheddon & West Monkton and Sixpenny Handley;
The Fall Guy at Beaminster (Public Rooms), Churchinford, Wookey Hole, Shrewton and Bransgore;
Vindication Swim at Highcliffe (community centre) and Chilthorne Domer;
La Chimera at Bourton;
Riddle of Fire at Fawley
… and The Greatest Showman at Charlton Marshall.

For dates and venues see the Arts Diary; for more information on the films and timings, visit www.moviola.org