A hard-working, happily married man John Stevens (Claude Rains) somewhat abruptly returns home from an agreeably lazy holiday in the mountains in order to celebrate his wedding anniversary, and is then unremittingly Rod Serlinged, with little grace into a dismally unrecognisable, dystopian, iron-fisted, fascist run America! Numbly traversing eerily deserted streets, retailers barred from selling their wares for reason obscure, John's disorientation increasing as he desperately seeks his lost wife and children. Roughly imprisoned for not expressing the newly enforced terror-state, he is then brutally interrogated for crimes he simply cannot comprehend! On one level Arch Oboler's 'Strange Holiday' is shrill, blunt force propaganda, about as subtle as the terrible blood-tide of national Socialism this singular drama is so ardently warning its viewers to fight against; but Claude Rain's raw, uncomfortably pained performance remains both stunningly powerful, and remarkably affecting to this very day.
The oppressive atmosphere generated by this incumbent tyrannical regime is menacingly realised by the capable director, and the truly nightmarish interrogation scene by the maniacal, doggerel-spewing, increasingly sadistic Gestapo Politzist still makes for squirmingly uncomfortable viewing! 'Strange Holiday', while somewhat jarring in its technique, with its portentous usage of pedantic newsreel rhetoric, Ozzie & Harriet homespun smugness, and a terrifyingly stark, Fritz Lang edginess coalesces uneasily into one of the more memorably strange 40s-era agitprop fantasies I have ever seen! Without belabouring the point, I have absolutely no idea why Claude Rain's earnest performance hasn't been given greater kudos by the film loving cognoscenti! Fun B-Movie fact! John Stevens wife is played by the stunning, otherworldly beautiful Gloria Holden ('Dracula's Daughter').
The oppressive atmosphere generated by this incumbent tyrannical regime is menacingly realised by the capable director, and the truly nightmarish interrogation scene by the maniacal, doggerel-spewing, increasingly sadistic Gestapo Politzist still makes for squirmingly uncomfortable viewing! 'Strange Holiday', while somewhat jarring in its technique, with its portentous usage of pedantic newsreel rhetoric, Ozzie & Harriet homespun smugness, and a terrifyingly stark, Fritz Lang edginess coalesces uneasily into one of the more memorably strange 40s-era agitprop fantasies I have ever seen! Without belabouring the point, I have absolutely no idea why Claude Rain's earnest performance hasn't been given greater kudos by the film loving cognoscenti! Fun B-Movie fact! John Stevens wife is played by the stunning, otherworldly beautiful Gloria Holden ('Dracula's Daughter').