it's that time
christmas time is here
everybody knows there’s not a better time of year.
what are YOUR favorite christmas movies and why?
1. christmas vacation (no surprise there. probably the funniest movie ever.)
2. home alone (no surprise there. can’t get enough of it, really. that marv cracks me up.)
3. meet me in st. louis (this movie is beautiful. judy garland is amazing.)
Comments
I’m tied between Christmas Vacation and Charlie Brown Christmas. Everything else pales in comparison, even Christmas Story (no dispect to Christmas Story — it’s still great and probably a distant #3).
I second John’s picks, although I’d make it a 3 way tie with Christmas Story. All 3 are completely different takes but all are also sentimental without being cloying or hokey and also representing the ridiculousness and downsides of the season.
Gremlins
This is the perfect allegory for the Christmas holiday: a bunch of unwanted visitors storm into your home, act like they live there, and trash the place. Giving a gift can be an act of kindness, but it may also rile up some pretty negative forces.
Batman Forever
Two utterly lonely people can’t deal with their emotions and fail to make a connection, all while a beautiful snowfall blankets a very alienating and monolithic cityscape. In the background of this story, a hostile psychopath metes out jealous revenge for all the holiday cheer and warmth he was never invited to experience, nearly destroying an entire city as a result.
Black Christmas
Margot Kidder seems very drunk. During the holiday season, I often come across the same way.
The Pee-Wee’s Playhouse Christmas Special
Pee-Wee staves off an avalanche of fruitcake while Little Richard learns how to properly prepare ice skates, Charo and K.D. Lang sing, and a giant box meant for the White House accidentally gets delivered to the Playhouse. When Grace Jones bursts out of it and learns that she isn’t in the presence of the President of the United States, she decides to belt out a very angry gay club version of Little Drummer Boy as punishment.
i am obsessed with christmas specials and will paste my pointless reviews of all the rankin/bass material (and others) sometime later. but right now we’re going out to dinner.
Cleary, none of you have any taste in movies.
I’m assuming by now that everyone has seen this:
Change the channels and adjust the rabbit ears for holiday fun and excitement.
wow, this is an all-star cast!
The Muppet Family Christmas baby, there’s nothing better.
Evan said:Cleary, none of you have any taste in movies.
(santa’s slay opening scene vid)
we own that. i haven’t watched most of it (i got it for bill) but it looks amazing. white buffalo!
maggie said:
we own that. i haven’t watched most of it (i got it for bill) but it looks amazing. white buffalo!
Fuck, really? I really don’t think I’m well-versed enough to be a horror snob, but that clip proved how utterly horrible that movie must be. I mean, Horror used to be “bad” in certain ways (campy, implausibility, bad acting, bad effects, beyond-gratuitous violence, etc.), but the good bad horror movies were self-aware, and humble about their shortcomings. This scene is a smiling, winking, “Hey, this is going to be awesome and ‘outrageous’,” bullshit self-abortion of “horror.” I really resent this has-been/never-was cast that exist for the sake of their own irony.
Fuck, watching that made me so incredibly mad.
I’m still mad!
Goddamnit, I HATE that that movie exists. Poor people died of starvation homeless and freezing in the streets, but some asshole paid some other doucheface to (poorly) CGI fire onto Fran Drescher’s head. Waste of money. You could have burned that poor person alive and filmed it for less! And it at least would have looked good.
Fuck everything about that movie. FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK. Goddamnit, I hate EVERYTHING because of that movie. WHO THE FUCK IS IN CHARGE OF MOVIES AND WHY THE HELL HAVEN’T THEY BEEN KILLED ON SCREEN?! WHAT IS THIS BULLSHIT HALF-ASSING AND REHASHING THAT PLAGUES CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN CINEMA?!
Truly there is no God.
Will fuckingSmith is starring in the Hollywood crapdaptation of Oldboy, a movie that was way more awesome and amazing than the comic on which it was based and the adaptation that came before it (both, I’ve heard, were pussified versions. Yes, pussified.). NOW they’re going to remake what was perfect, but this time put Welcome-to-Earf, Aw-HELL-Naw Will fuckingSmith in the lead. There’s no way this version will be anywhere near as ballsy (re: good) as Oldboy.
I thought Oldboy was one of those Takishi Miike torture type movies? Am I to assume based off of your post that I’m wrong about that? Tell me more about this movie.
Also I sort of agree with your Santa’s Slay rant but that’s because I hate comedy with my horror. It’s why I’m always on the receiving end of untold amounts of rage when I tell people I didn’t really like Shaun of the Dead all that much. I’m guessing you’re rage at that scene/movie wasn’t coming from a similar place emotionally.
Oldboy is an incredibly awesome revenge flick by a Korean director. It’s pulpy exploitation fare, but in a good way… not in that utterly depraved and hateful Miike way.
Sammy has officially ruined my day with this Will Smith news.
Sammy said:psst, santa is played by a fucking pro wrestler. the movie is fully aware of how much it sucks, and makes itself ludicrous because of that. ok? ok. breathe a little.maggie said:
we own that. i haven’t watched most of it (i got it for bill) but it looks amazing. white buffalo!Fuck, really? I really don’t think I’m well-versed enough to be a horror snob, but that clip proved how utterly horrible that movie must be. I mean, Horror used to be “bad” in certain ways (campy, implausibility, bad acting, bad effects, beyond-gratuitous violence, etc.), but the good bad horror movies were self-aware, and humble about their shortcomings. This scene is a smiling, winking, “Hey, this is going to be awesome and ‘outrageous’,” bullshit self-abortion of “horror.” I really resent this has-been/never-was cast that exist for the sake of their own irony.
Fuck, watching that made me so incredibly mad.
- Christmas Vacation
- The Grinch (the original, fuck you Jim Carrey)
- Love Actually (I watch it with my mom, so fuck off)
Yo, Love Actually is a ridiculously good movie, even if my sperm count does drop 30% every time I watch it.
Youc an also count me among the eunuchs who thinks that Love Actually is a great holiday movie.
That scene of everyone at the airport….it just gives me warm fuzzies.
I’ve yet to be able to watch Love Actually without turning into a blubbering mess. Heidi! Let’s watch that soon!
Christmas Vacation has me nearly peeing every year. I’ve been known to watch it all the way through, then backtrack to the “rant scene” with the moose egg nog mugs (which I’ve been trying to find for a while) and watch it three more times.
I’m also a huge fan of all of the Muppet xmas movies including, but not limited to, Muppet Family Christmas, Muppet Christmas Carol, Emmet Otter’s Jug Band Christmas and so on. I love me some Muppets.
Riverbottom Nightmare Band!
I just watched a Muppet Christmas Carol with my kids last week. That came out after I was too old to really be into muppet related stuff, but it was much darker than I anticipated and largely true to the source material, albeit with puppets thrown into the mix. Michael Caine plays it surprisingly straight, and the 3 ghosts weren’t established muppets and were surprisingly creepy.
Man, I haven’t watched that movie since I was a kid. I remember it being awesome.
you are never, ever too old to love the muppets.
Let me clarify: Too old to still watch the muppets, but too young to have them appeal to my sense of nostalgia or youthful idealism.
The Ref
Die Hard
Bad Santa was alright, just a few off the top of my head that noone mentioned yet.
“You know what I’m going to get you next Christmas, Mom? A big wooden cross, so that every time you feel unappreciated for your sacrifices, you can climb on up and nail yourself to it.”
maggie said:you are never, ever too old to love the muppets.
AGREED!
In fact, I bought my dad The Muppet Show box set for christmas a year or two ago and threw in a side of Bullwinkle box sets. I take after my Pops in being an overgrown child, and I’m completely OK with that!
Justin said:Riverbottom Nightmare Band!
Really, this is the first time someone has ever acknowledged that they’ve seen this! I usually get the blank stare!
maggie said: psst, santa is played by a fucking pro wrestler. the movie is fully aware of how much it sucks, and makes itself ludicrous because of that. ok? ok. breathe a little.
For my money, movies that become self-aware enough to know how much they suck should not make themselves ludicrous as a result, but should silently implode, or self-abort.
Kevin said:
I didn’t really like Shaun of the Dead all that much.
I actually find this surprising, just because of how likable I find Shaun of the Dead to be. I honestly think it’s a great movie, but I wouldn’t get all bent out of shape about you not liking it. You’re wrong is all. <3
But, there’s a lot to be said for separating humor and horror. For example, I just watched the first three Return of the Living Deads recently, and I have to say the second (which I considered to be the most overtly “humorous” of the three) was easily the least enjoyable. That little severed torso/head that delivers two funny lines was completely unnecessary, and actually kind of disrupted the feel and flow of the movie.
Now, one could easily argue that the Return movies are pretty ridiculous and self-aware of their own limitations, but they don’t rely on/revert to the wink-wink, nudge-nudge of C/D-list pseudo-celebrities long past the sad sliver in entertainment history that could have been considered their “prime.”
I also love Love Actually. So much so that I actually have it in Fullscreen version. My parents bought me the wrong version for Christmas one year, and I like the movie so much I’m unwilling to toss it as a result of its flawed format.
Sammy, good call on the Return movies. I’m willing to give those a pass because they’re so awesome and because they’re pre-ironic horror movies before the whole wink-nudge thing.
In fact I’m willing to concede that I’m a hypocrite for liking the first one so much since there’s a ton of humor in it. But yeah, it walks the line pretty well. The third one has no humor in it at all and that’s the one I’ve seen the most recently.