My husband and I, lovers of old movies, stumbled onto a good one that’s perfect for the holidays.

“Remember the Night” (1940) features Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray in the story of a district attorney whose effort to get out of town so he can get home to Indiana in time for Christmas results in a shoplifter being detained in jail until after New Year’s…unless he takes responsibility for her over the holidays. So he drags her along on his road trip back home, where she meets his kind family, who treat her much better than most thieves would expect.

My husband is a Hoosier, with several wonderful relatives still living “back home in Indiana,” so the movie had special relevance for him. But I liked it a lot, too, and I’m amazed that Stanwyck and MacMurray could play characters that are so very different from those they played in “Double Indemnity,” their most famous movie pairing (and not a movie for kids).

This is a different kind of holiday movie with a surprise ending; we really liked it, and will probably watch it next Christmas, too.