Reviewing Christmas Movies Worth Watching
It just wouldn’t feel like the Christmas season without TBS running “A Christmas Story” 24/7 leading up to the big day. The Bumpkiss hounds are running through the house eating roast turkey, Ralphy is wishing for his Red Rider BB Gun, the leg lamp is shining in the window and a blanket of white snow has quieted the neighborhood bullies, if only for Christmas Day. This is just one of many nostalgic movies that light up our hearts this holiday season.
Christmas classics seem to reign supreme for the baby boomer generation. The black-and-white nostalgia of “It’s a Wonderful Life” (1946) captures the innocence and the good will of a nation struggling to regain a sense of optimism following World War II. James Stewart and Donna Reed give compelling performances in a heart-wrenching tale of a suicidal man’s realization that he meant so much to so many people. Another old Christmas season classic from the same era is “Miracle on 34th Street” (1947), which was remade in 1994. A department store Santa finds himself in court when he professes to be the real deal, which captures the heart of a six-year-old skeptic. Lastly, White Christmas (1954), starring Bing Crosby, where dance, romance and hard economic times take center stage.
If you’re a family who likes to laugh together and your kids are a bit older, then perhaps Christmas dysfunction is more your motif. In addition to the ever-popular “A Christmas Story” (1983), don’t forget “Home Alone” and “Trapped In Paradise” (1994). A 2008 dysfunctional Merry Xmas tale is “Four Christmases,” starring Reese Witherspoon and Vince Vaughn who try to race from place to place to see all their divorced parents. Then there’s always the reliably hilarious “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” (1989), starring Chevy Chase. “He wants a wonderful experience with his in-laws, who turn out to be creeps. He wants a close relationship with his kids, but it is stressed. He considers his decorating a grand achievement, but it’s mocked as a disaster,” explains Gary Hoppenstand, a professor of American Studies at Michigan State University. “The holidays can be a depressing time. Comedy can help us laugh at ourselves and realize we are fallible, too.”
Some Christmas movies re-visited later in lfe may strike you as quite odd the second time around. “Babes in Toyland” (1986) is definitely one of those movies. Suddenly you recognize Lisa Piper as a young Drew Barrymore and Keanu Reeves as “Jack Be Nimble.” At its heart, it is a story about a child who grows up too fast, but on the exterior there is an evil villain bowling his home down the streets of Toyland, bizarre minions fighting toy soldiers and a rather fantastical setting. Of course, there were many other versions of this tale as well, most notably the film featuring Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy.
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