Bill Melendez’s A Charlie Brown Christmas is one of those holiday classics that has held up for over fifty years. There’s something so incredibly sad, and incredibly relevant, about this film and the way Charlie Brown keeps trying to find some kind of meaning in the holiday season, but keeps running into selfishness, pettiness, and thoughtlessness. The fact that even in the ‘60s, Christmas has become this garish mess of plastic, pink trees and entitled children demanding presents they believe they deserve makes you reflect on how supercharged the holiday has become due to the way we have let capitalism run amuck across our country. It’s enough to make anyone feel like Charlie Brown. The animation style is still charming and simple, the vocal performances incredibly compelling. It still remains one of the great classics of the Christmas season.