I'll Be Seeing You (1944)

(Texas; Dec 24, 1943- January 1, 1944)

World War II homefront movie (a genera for which I am most defiantly a sucker) that at least tried to be somewhat raw and cutting edge, even in the tried and true solder-meets-girl-while-on-furlough formula. In this case the solder in Joseph Cotton, a shell shocked veteran of the Pacific Theater who has nowhere to go on Christmas leave because he is an orphan (aaww, that's sad). Luckily however Joseph meets Ginger Rogers on the train from Dallas, he gets himself invited to Christmas dinner with her at her aunt and uncles place (that's good), and they fall in love (even better). However (uh oh), Ms. Ginger is keeping from Joseph a terrible secret, she is not the traveling saleslady she claims to be, in fact she is on a brief furlough herself, only from prison instead of the army. You see three or four years previous Ginger was convicted of involuntary manslaughter, when she accidentally killed her boss as he was attempting to rap her. So as you can see this not your typical war time love story, despite having a number of its cliched trappings. In fact this movie is so kinda odd, I still don't know exactly what to make of it, suffice it to say I prefer my Joseph Cotton to be a little more jovial, especially around the Holidays.

Fun Fact: The same year this movie was released Joseph Cotton appeared in another (and far superior) homefront movie called 'Since You Went Away', in which Shirley Temple (who plays Gingers cousin) also appeared.