Muppet Christmas Carol is one for us, plus, in recent years we’ve saved the “Ghosts” christmas special for the day itself.
Halloween is DTV’s Monster Hits. This is pure childhood nostalgia. For many years I had a VHS copy recorded off the Disney Channel in 1987 and I watched it religiously each year through 2010 or so when my ancient tape finally died. Thank God for streaming. I also spend part of October watching The Simpson’s Treehouse of Horror episodes. Well, most of them. Some are stupid and/or have aged horribly, like the Lucy Lawless episode.
Thanksgiving is Home for the Holidays (although it hasn’t really aged well and I’m not as into it as my wife is). I also like Planes, Trains, and Automobiles although that’s not really a tradition as I’ll go several years between viewings.
Agreed on all points. It’s by far the most faithful version I know of. We try to watch it every year as well.
When our kids were little we would watch the Harry Potter films over Christmas break but as my boys have grown and their interests have shifted that tradition seems to have gone the way of the dodo.
Sometimes I watch It’s a Wonderful Life but my wife isn’t a fan so that’s not really a tradition. I used to watch the Christmas King of the Hill episodes mid-December when I had them all recorded on a VHS tape, but the days I possessed that technology are long gone and I don’t have a Hulu subscription so that no longer is a thing. I also usually watch the Disney Christmas shorts (the Scrooge McDuck as Ebenezer in the Christmas Carol episode, the Mickey decorating the Xmas tree with Pluto fighting Chip and Dale episode, etc.). My wife always watches White Christmas sometime in December. I find that 2 hour claptrap pure drivel so I refuse to partake. We used to watch National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation but I got to the point where I could quote every line so it lost much of its appeal. Same with A Christmas Story.
Die Hard is a must at Christmas. So is A Charlie Brown Christmas.
We also usually watch the OG Home Alone at Christmas as well the OG The Santa Clause.
Not a movie, but every other year or so I read Ken Follett’s Whiteout, starting on Christmas day.
The end of the school year we always watched Camp Nowhere, a sadly underrated Disney film about a group of kids who rent their own summer camp sans parental or adult oversight and, of course, hijinks ensue. It’s Jessica Alba’s first film role and one of Burgess Meredith’s last roles, admittedly a small one.
Almost all of the above are simply childhood traditions that are maintained out of nostalgia. I’m not a big movie or TV watcher so in alternate universe where I had no wife or children I’d probably watch Planes, Trains, and Automobiles at Thanksgiving, Die Hard at Christmas, and Camp Nowhere in June.
My family was never a movie tradition kind of family. At best, my brother and I would hang out and watch the “Ten Commandments” to laugh at Yul Brynner and Charlton Heston. “A Christmas Story” might end up on the TV on Christmas Day many years, but it wasn’t a situation where everyone would sit down and watch it from beginning to end or anything.
My wife’s family however, seems to always watch “It’s a Wonderful Life” every year on Xmas eve, and she always watches “Meet Me in St. Louis” around Xmas as well. “A Christmas Story” usually ends up on TV on Xmas Day, and on occasion, we end up watching it through, but as often as not, we just watch it in bits and pieces over the course of the day.
My kids are of the ages where “Elf” is super hysterical, so that’s become a holiday must-watch, but I suspect that’s only going to be a 3-4 year period, not a forever thing.
As far as other holiday movies go, Scrooged, Christmas Vacation and Home Alone are ones that the TV will stay on if we run across it. My wife also watches a bunch of Hallmark/Lifetime Xmas movies (
) every year as well.
I watch Planes, Trains, and Automobiles on Thanksgiving as well. I honestly wish some cable channel did a marathon the same way USA does with A Christmas Story. Although that’s moot now that I’ve cut the cord. It’s probably just as well; the “clean” version of the rental car scene kind of ruins the movie for me.
And speaking of the A Christmas Story marathon, I insist on watching it on Christmas day every year. The rest of my family isn’t as big on is as I am, but it’s an important part of Christmas for me.
A Christmas Carol (1951) with Alastair Sims. I don’t care what anyone says, Sims is Scrooge.
Home Alone / Home Alone 2. I actually prefer the sequel
A Charlie Brown Christmas. Childhood memories
12 Days of Tudor Christmas. Not a movie, but a history documentary about Xmas traditions in the good old days.
I was much older than I should admit before I realized that when ABC calls The Ten Commandments “a holiday tradition” that the holiday is not Easter. It’s Passover. (The story has nothing to do with Easter, and everything to do with Passover.)
Christmas must-sees:
Alastair Sim
Muppet Christmas Carol
IAWL, but just from the point where the money is lost and the shit hits the fan.
Prep and Landing. An under-appreciated animated gem.
In the 1960s The Wizard Of Oz was aired every year near Christmas so that was kind of a tradition back then.
It’s A Wonderful Life was huge during the 1980s and early '90s, when it was returned to copyright status; this reduced hundreds of airings on local stations to about three. We always watched it, and I was disappointed that it was no longer something you could just turn on your TV and find, on some channel. I liked the film but not enough to make sure I could be at home watching TV when it was going to be shown.
I hate Christmas Story and I hate It’s A Wonderful Life.
I do watch Planes Trains and Automobiles every Thanksgiving, and Rudolf at Christmas. And veryfrank my brother! I also watch Scrooged, love that movie!
I don’t have very many holiday movie traditions, but that’s definitely one of them! Christmas has always been very special to me and my whole working life I always made a point of taking a couple of weeks off during the holidays starting a day or two before Christmas. To me the movie’s fantastically upbeat theme song “Christmas Vacation” (FTR: music by Barry Mann, lyrics by Cynthia Weil and performed by Mavis Staples) has for years been the introduction to the joys of the holiday season.
A less comedic Christmas tradition is A Christmas Carol, the 1951 version with Alistair Sim.
Fun movie, but not really a holiday tradition for me.
We used to trim the tree with ‘A Charlie Brown Christmas’ playing in the background. Such nice jazzy music, a little melancholy.
Now I am alone. I will watch ‘A Christmas Story’ for all 24 hours. And on Thanksgiving, the whole Macy’s parade and the Westminster Dog Show after. Easter, give me the gaudy old spectacles - ‘Ben Hur’, ‘the Greatest Story Ever Told’, ‘the Ten Commandments’ which are as close as I get to religion now…
It’s almost sacrilege to let this song play so early in the season, but here it is anyway …
I never realized this was Mavis Staples singing it, now I like it even more.
mmm
When we had young kids or grandkids we would always watch Rudolph numerous times. Now with the just the two of us, we’ll put it on but lose interest in it. I’ve been watching it for 58 years. My son watched it every day (more than once) the summer he was 2! So I’ve had my fill of Rudolph although it will always have a place in my heart.
My favorites are:
Elf
Christmas Carol (Patrick Stewart)
Grinch (Jim Carrey)
It’s a Wonderful Life
A Christmas Story
Christmas Vacation
Miracle on 34th Street
But we don’t make it a point to watch them every year. If we happen to come across one of them we might watch all of it or part of it…
I love the original “Home Alone” movie. It’s not a set tradition, but it seems to happen every holiday season.
I like The Ref for Christmas, but I have to watch it by myself, since it’s too dark a take for anyone else. (Not in absolute terms, but absolutely in Christmas movie terms).