What’s the greatest Christmas movie of all time? Well, before we tackle that question, we have to take a step back and ask what makes a movie a “Christmas movie” in the first place. It’s a trickier problem than you think. Being set during the Christmas season is a necessary, but not sufficient, factor. If all you needed were jingle bells in the background, then Shane Black—the brains behind Lethal Weapon, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, and Iron Man 3, all of which take place around Christmastime—would be the undisputed champ of Christmas cinema, the auteur of Noel. But none of those movies are really Christmas movies. So he’s not.
What about Die Hard, the 1988 Bruce Willis action classic? It was released during summer blockbuster season, but it’s about terrorists who take over an office building during a Christmas party. So many film-school hipsters have declared it a Christmas movie that BuzzFeed—BuzzFeed!—felt the need to publish a piece declaring that the take was no longer hot. But Die Hard is clearly not a Christmas movie, because Christmas isn’t intrinsic to the plot. The story could have just as easily taken place during, say, the Fourth of July. All that matters to the mechanics of Die Hard is that people gather at Nakatomi Plaza so Alan Rickman can become an international star by lecturing his hostages on the finer points of bespoke menswear.
In order to make the cut as a Christmas movie, the holiday has to be integral to a film’s actions and inform its themes. Take Home Alone, Chris Columbus’ 1990 film about a kid named Kevin whose family goes on vacation without him. The plot involves a pair of criminals robbing homes that are (a) filled with new loot, in the form of Christmas presents, and (b) empty of people, who are traveling for the holidays. Throw in the fact that the movie’s key themes are family togetherness and forgiveness, and the taxonomy is settled: Home Alone is definitely a Christmas movie.
Is it a great Christmas movie, though? Probably not: As Barack Obama said of Hillary Clinton, it’s likable enough. Screenwriter John Hughes deftly mixed sentimentality and comedy, popping a heartwarming conclusion on top of what is basically just a bawdy amalgamation of body humor and annoying kid stuff. Home Alone isn’t as funny as the funniest Christmas movies, and yet its sentimentality is more cloying than even the schmaltziest ones.
The grandfather of the genre is Miracle on 34th Street. The 1947 classic from George Seaton is about proving that Santa Claus, the Christmassiest figure of them all in our increasingly secular society, is real. The story of a doubtful little girl whose harridan of a working mother has driven all faith from her, Miracle on 34th Street is about reclaiming wonder from cynicism and the importance of opening yourself up to love. It also might be the greatest endorsement of the U.S. Postal Service ever, with the film’s climactic scene revolving around giant bags of mail being delivered to the courtroom. (It’s amusing that in a seventy-year-old movie, the biggest anachronism is an ironclad belief in the competence of the Post Office.)
But the king of this category is Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life, the 1946 monument to Americana. Capra embraces a sort of communal individualism that has long been the bedrock of American society: Jimmy Stewart’s George Bailey is a hero who saves his brother and the town pharmacist and the family bank through a combination of blind bravery and devoted selflessness.
You would think that A Christmas Carol should fall into this category of greats, too, but the problem with Dickens’ classic is that there are so many competing movie versions to choose from. The best-loved straight-up adaptation is probably 1951’s Scrooge, starring Alastair Sim as the titular miser. Then again, some people prefer the classic 1938 version starring Reginald Owen. And who can forget the 1970 musical adaptation starring Albert Finney? Or the 1984 version starring George C. Scott? Or the 1999 TV movie starring Jean-Luc Picard? Or the 2009 motion-capture version directed by Robert Zemeckis and starring Jim Carrey as not only Scrooge but also the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future, too?
Many, perhaps most, of these are dreadful (An American Carol, Ghosts of Girlfriends Past), but every once in a while you get a classic. My personal favorite is Bill Murray’s Scrooged, which doubles as a fantastic Christmas movie and the best commentary on the soullessness of the television industry and the craven executives who have run it since Network.
Dark in a different way is Tim Burton’s The Nightmare before Christmas, the only movie that works for both Christmas and Halloween. It features great set design and a fascinating premise paired with catchy tunes. Stop-motion animation has nothing on the more traditional variety, however, and there’s a reason Boris Karloff’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas! has been in constant rotation for the last five decades.
But The Grinch gets downgraded in my book for inspiring what has to be the single worst Christmas movie in history: Jim Carrey’s live-action adaptation of the same name. It’s pretty remarkable that Carrey has managed to star in not one, but two, of the most unnecessary adaptations of beloved Christmas movies. If you want someone to crap all over a Christmas classic, Carrey’s your guy. And you might want to look out: Given that his Grinch came out in 2000 and his Scrooge dropped in 2009, we’re just about due for Another Garbage Jim Carrey Christmas Movie.
The aforementioned Miracle on 34th Street notwithstanding, Santa is more frequently blasphemed against than venerated these days. Do you have any idea how many cheap, terrible, horror Christmas movies there are? Among (many) others, there’s Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984), Santa’s Slay (2005), and Santa Claws (1996). If I’m forced to pick a “favorite,” I guess I go with Santa’s Slay; not only is the pun to die for (get it?), it also stars former professional wrestler Bill Goldberg as a demon Mr. Claus. It’s one thing to portray Ol’ Saint Nick as a demonic murderer; that’s all in good fun.
In 1997 TNT began running one movie, over and over, for twenty-four consecutive hours spanning Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. This movie has earned a place in our culture, in our hearts, and in our homes as a mainstay of the Christmas season. I speak, of course, of A Christmas Story. The 1983 film did solid, if unremarkable, business in its initial theatrical run. But the quest of a towheaded scamp named Ralphie to get a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas resonated with people over the long haul. In part, this is because Ralphie manages to navigate the everyday childhood indignities most of us remember with, if not fondness, then some sentimentality: the taste of soap after ill-advised wise-acreage; the ever-looming threat of bullies on the prowl; the overwhelming, soulful desire to own a piece of exquisite, manly hardware frustrated—over and over.
It doesn’t matter if you’re watching It’s a Wonderful Life or Scrooged or A Christmas Story. What matters is that you’re watching it with your family, year after year. As you grow up together. As you grow old together. So don’t worry about which Christmas movie is the “best.” Just pick one—there’s no shortage to choose from—and start a tradition. And the best one will be the one that’s yours.
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To read more from Sonny and other great conservative writers on the wonder of Christmas, purchase a copy of The Christmas Virtues at Templeton Press, Amazon, or Barnes & Noble. The Christmas Virtues is a humorous companion for, and guide to, navigating the trials and tribulations of the holiday season. It’s a reminder of how we can embrace the joy, hope, and love of Christmas—of the real Christmas. And a call for us to stand up for Christmas, because America needs is now, more than ever.
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