The Movies of Christmas

[Ithilwen]

From Frosty the Snowman to the Grinch whose heart was two sizes too small, nothing defines the Christmas season quite so well as sitting down with a warm cup of hot chocolate and turning on a holiday film. Old and new movies alike, they have defined not only our holidays, but many times, our childhood.

Which holiday films are your favorites?

Which holiday films have you always wanted to see, but so far have not?

Do you have any special memories of a holiday film, such as sharing them with certain loved ones, or interesting stories about them you'd like to tell?


~Riella

[starkat]

Once Upon A Christmas
Twice Upon a Christmas

and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.

I dearly love Christmas movies. I don't get the opportunity to watch as many as I'd like at Christmas time. I may have to break habit this year and watch more Christmas movies during the year.

Oooo... The Nativity. love that movie too.

Rudolph's the movie I grew up watching on TV every year. I finally broke down and bought the dvd. Time to pull it out.

The Santa Clause 3 was a movie my dad and I went to theaters to watch together. It was a Daddy/daughter outing.

[Aslans_Jewel]

Has anyone watched The Black Candle? Great movie centering on Kwanzaa.
Also, thanks Ithy for not making this a Christmas only thread!

[starkat]

So does a release in December make it a Christmas/Holiday movie?

If so...

LWW

'nough said.

Oh and Return of the King.

[narnianerd]

Oh man, my favorite holiday movie was An American Tail, remember that one? Well, my grandmother was born Jewish, so we would always watch this after she lit the candles. Well its a parable for the Holocaust and opens in a dank hole in Nazi/cat-occupied Russia, with the Jewish Mousekewitz family celebrating a bittersweet Hanukkah, gripping their customs with ardor despite the danger in said practice. It really taught me to stand up for what I believed in, in spite of the fact that my family are practicing Christian's. Thanks Izzy, for including my family traditions in this thread and not excluding anyone.

[Ithilwen]

I just realized I forgot to answer my own questions!

One of my favorite Christmas movies is A Christmas Story. There's just something very true-to-life about it, the way it includes all the imperfections of the family, rather than making things seem cosy all the time, if that makes sense. A lot of times, Christmas films will make families seem more perfect than they are in real life; but that movie, I think, shows people as they are. Also, I like how there are often day-long marathons of the movie on Christmas Day.


~Riella

[daughter of the King]

Which holiday films are your favorites? The Muppets Christmas Carol is probably one of my favorite holiday movies of all time. Because Muppets! The first time I watched it I thought it would be too ridiculous, but I was surprised at how well they did the story while still being very Muppetish. Actually, I don't think there is a version of A Christmas Carol that I don't like, although I certainly wouldn't watch all of them at once.

Which holiday films have you always wanted to see, but so far have not? Oddly enough, I still haven't got around to seeing The Nightmare Before Christmas. I'm hoping to correct that oversight next year.

Do you have any special memories of a holiday film, such as sharing them with certain loved ones, or interesting stories about them you'd like to tell? I think the only holiday films my family would watch without fail when I was growing up were A Charlie Brown Christmas and White Christmas.

A more recent holiday tradition is Bundle of Joy, which is about a salesgirl at a department store who finds a baby outside a foundling home and everyone assumes the baby is hers. It's rather silly, but great fun. My older sister found it playing on TCM a few years ago and we've watched it every time it airs on TCM in December ever since.

It's a Wonderful Life is another holiday favorite I suppose, but we usually watched it in July for whatever reason, so I've never really thought of it as a holiday movie.

[Shadowlander]

It's a Wonderful Life is my all-time favorite Christmas movie, but Home Alone, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, and A Christmas Story are right on its heels. It will never be overtaken though.

Amazingly we're halfway through December and I have yet to watch a single Christmas movie...weird. I'll rectify that this coming weekend.

I do traditionally watch MST3K's Yuletide classic Santa Claus Conquers the Martians. It's best with a group but my wife doesn't like it (even if she lives less than an hour from where they made it) and my kid is too young to get it.

[Ryadian]

What holiday film is my favorite? Easy: The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Admittedly, this is partly because I've only seen a handful of the "classic" Christmas movies, and the only ones my family watched regularly over the years were the Grinch, A Charlie Brown Christmas, Rudolph (which I don't enjoy much anymore ) and a handful of half-hour specials (like the first VeggieTales one, The Toy That Saved Christmas). Sadly, we lost our tape player this year, and a lot of the Christmas movies we used to watch, we only have on VHS. But still, the Grinch is one that I watch every year and am reminded of how good it is. It's a fun ride with a heartwarming ending; what more can you want?

As for one I've been planning to see... honestly, I've seen a lot of the ones I want to. I've seen It's A Wonderful Life, White Christmas, etc. I may eventually watch the original Miracle on 34th Street, however; I've seen the 90's remake, and all I've heard since then is how the original is so much better.

Oddly, a lot of the memories I have associated with Christmas movies, aside from the ones you might expect, are critical. I remember a Christmas special (when I was about 12 or 13) called Olive the Other Reindeer, which was about a dog name Olive who becomes convinced that Santa is putting out a call for "Olive the Other Reindeer" instead of "all of the other reindeer". This was the first time I watched a movie (that I can remember) and actually realized that it was kind of dumb and knew why. I'm usually not a huge fan of Christmas movies that are mostly whimsical without a lot of heartwarming with it, so this trend persisted through the rest of my childhood and into adulthood when I saw new Christmas movies.

I do have one really amazing Christmas movie memory, though, from the first time I remember watching A Charlie Brown Christmas. I was eight years old and at a friend's house. I was only partly paying attention to the movie, because we were doing something else at the time (I think making ornaments?), until it got to the part where Linus takes center stage and explains "the True Meaning of Christmas". I was completely blown away, and that scene still gives me chills.

[wild rose]

In my family, our favorite of favorites Christmas film is The Preacher's Wife, we watch it every year on (western) Christmas eve. My brother is tired of the tradition, and always tries to get us to watch something else, but he's got five sisters against him

Little Lord Fauntleroy ends with Christmas, so we all consider it a Christmas film and watch it during the Christmas season. Some of my other favorite Christmas films are A Christmas Carol (the 1984 version), The Nativity and It's a Wonderful Life

[Impending Doom]

At our home we always watch Beatrix Potter's The tale of Gloucester on Christmas Eve. It's not exactly a Christmas movie, but I think it counts. Throughout December we like to watch movies as an entire family. My favourites ones are Santa Clause 3 and Elf!

[SnowAngel]

We watched We're No Angels on Friday, it gets better every time. And now each of us kids has our own copy of We're No Angels. We got them for Christmas! It's the first "classic" movie in my small DVD collection.

We have watched most of our Christmas movie collection, still need to watch the Nativity Story though. Although I am not sure when we will have time to watch it, we got two different DVD collections for Christmas.

SnowAngel