Top Christmas movies ranked: The 20 best

On By Littum

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Santa Claus is coming to town, but you still have a few days to seek out everyone holiday movie ticket price.

There are of course the classics, like Macaulay Culkin taking on sinister villains in the Beloved “Home Alone” or Bill Murray’s self-centered TV executive learning a thing or two about the meaning of Christmas in “Scrooged,” a take on Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.” Or maybe you will more modern optionslike Dwayne Johnson/Chris Evans action movies “Red” or Netflix’s new double feature, “Hot Frosty” and “The merry gentlemen.”

In honor of the holiday season, let’s rank the 20 best Christmas movies of all time.

20. ‘Home Alone’ (1990)

Culkin is unfailingly precocious, and seeing an 8-year-old inventively fold a pair of clueless adult burglars is fine and all. What is often forgotten amid the children’s bickering, however, is what the film has to say about the importance of family.

19. ‘The Ice Harvest’ (2005)

Set in Wichita, Kansas on Christmas Eve, this twisted, cool and funny film noir stars John Cusack as a mob lawyer who steals $2 million from his boss (Randy Quaid) and has trouble getting it out of town because of bad weather.

18. ‘Happiest Season’ (2020)

The inclusive and pleasant clever romantic comedy stars Kristen Stewart and Mackenzie Davis as a lesbian couple whose relationship is tested at a family reunion of deep secrets, conservative parents and competing siblings.

17. ‘The Nightmare Before Christmas’ (1993)

Is this a Halloween movie? Sure. And is it also a Christmas movie? You bet! Tim Burton puts his wacky spin on a holiday mashup in which Jack Skellington, the big man of Halloween Town, decides to take over various aspects of Christmas Town—and arrange the abduction of Santa Claus—until he realizes he wasn’t the best idea.

16. ‘Lethal Weapon’ (1987)

On its own, it’s one of the best buddy-cop action pictures, forcing Danny Glover’s aging Roger Murtaugh and Mel Gibson’s loose cannon Martin Riggs together. The seasonal stuff just makes it even better, including a shootout at a Christmas tree lot and Riggs struggling with suicidal thoughts and ultimately finding a family to share a holiday dinner with.

15. ‘Joyeux Noel’ (2005)

Earning an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Film, this war drama explores humanity’s triumph over brutality while telling the true story of the Christmas Truce of 1914, when the World War I battlefield welcomed carols instead of carnage.

14. ‘White Christmas’ (1954)

Two Bing Crosby musicals used the song “White Christmas”: Let’s skip 1942’s “Holiday Inn” (which has a creepy blackface sequence) and instead include Crosby teaming up with Danny Kaye as he makes G.I. are from World War II trying to save their old commanding officer’s inn with the help of a sister act (Rosemary Clooney and Vera-Ellen).

13. ‘Gremlins’ (1984)

The holiday tale also serves as a great entry into horror for youngsters, with a small town possessed by wild gremlins because teenagers can’t follow simple instructions. Also: Baby Yoda can only try to be at the level of cuteness as little Mogwai Gizmo in a pixie hat.

12. ‘The Shop Around the Corner’ (1940)

The basis for Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan’s romantic comedy “You’ve Got Mail” is this Hungarian holiday jam starring Jimmy Stewart and Margaret Sullavan as brawlers in a Budapest leather goods store who have unwittingly fallen in love. through anonymous letters.

11. ‘A Christmas Story’ (1983)

Full disclosure: I despised this movie as a kid who wasn’t into BB guns or leg lamps. As an adult, however, the comedy resonates more as an ode to the exhausting nature of being a parent around the holidays and how everyone is just trying to make it through the holidays, even the tired Santa at the mall.

10. ‘A Christmas Carol’ (1951)

Among the various “traditional” versions of the Charles Dickens classic – from “The Muppet Christmas Carol” to the excellent George C. Scott TV movie – this one cuts right to the dark tones of the original text, with Scrooge (Alastair Sim) alive. through an insightful horror film to come out the other side a better man.

9. ‘The Apartment’ (1960)

The romantic drama stars Jack Lemmon as a nebbish office drone known for lending his space to bosses who can take their mistresses. He turns the focus back on himself when he begins to fall hard for an elevator girl (Shirley MacLaine), whom the big boss (Fred MacMurray) secretly takes to the love den on Christmas Eve.

8. ‘The Holdovers’ (2023)

Alexander Payne’s throwback from the 1970s is a snarky but warm-hearted reminder of the holiday spirit. Paul Giamatti stars a teacher who is only stiff is stuck in school for winter break who befriends and bonds with a rebellious student (newcomer Dominic Sessa) and a grieving head chef (Da’Vine Joy Randolph, who won an Oscar for the role).

7. ‘Die Hard’ (1988)

Heck, it’s a Christmas movie, just in case there was any doubt. And sorry, Santa, no one squeezing through tight spaces in a building getting the job done—in the case of this action classic, thwarting terrorists and rescuing his estranged wife—better than Bruce Willis’ iconic John McClane.

6. ‘National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation’ (1989)

Anyone who’s ever tried too hard during the holidays can empathize with Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) and his hilarious struggles to decorate his house, deal with crazy relatives—we all have our own cousin Eddie (Randy Quaid)— and have the happiest Christmas imaginable, where he often acts as his worst enemy.

5. ‘Miracle on 34th Street’ (1947)

If you can withstand the gratuitous hypocrisy, there’s an exciting “Law & Order” episode to be had here, when Kris Kringle himself (Edmund Gwenn) does a little too good a job replacing a drunk Macy’s Parade elf and gets on trial for mental instability when he insists he’s the real deal.

4. ‘Love Actually’ (2003)

Often imitated, never duplicated. Intertwining tales of love with Brits and others conjure up all sorts of holiday emotions – some happy, some melancholic – and are utterly manipulative. But when you watch a little boy race through Heathrow to find his crush or watch Andrew Lincoln’s silent ode to Keira Knightley, you’re too busy being bombarded with emotion to care.

3. ‘Elf’ (2003)

Will Ferrell has one of his best roles as a naïve overgrown elf who finds out he’s actually human – with the late James Caan as his grumpy biological father – and the high jinks that ensue when he’s introduced to “civilization”, is filled with heart, humor and childlike wonder.

2. ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ (1946)

“Citizen Kane” of Christmas movies, although in this case everyone has seen Jimmy Stewart’s heavenly journey as George Bailey. Akin to the Scrooge model in its focus on the importance of a second chance, where a man is shown how bad life would have been if he hadn’t been born, this thing will straight up drag the Christmas spirit out of you kicking and screaming.

1. ‘Scrooged’ (1988)

Born out of ’80s greed, but timeless in its relevance, “Scrooged” is a perfect blend of slapstick and dark humor, love and loss, life and death that has nothing to do with being as amazing as it is. It’s an excellent cast, from Bill Murray’s modern Scrooge-y Frank Cross to Carol Kane’s adorably sadistic fairy. And if you’re not about to wind up when “Put a Little Love in Your Heart” starts, you might even get a visit from three ghosts yourself.