The Best Christmas Movies to Watch this Holiday Season

Christmas is one of the most celebrated holidays in America and is considered the best holiday by many ,such as sophomore Drew Klemsrud. “Christmas time just brings a feeling to you that you don’t get from any other holidays. The time you get to spend with family, giving & receiving presents, and eating good food makes Christmas the best holiday”, explained Drew. Obviously, there are going to be some movies made about the event that so many millions of people celebrate. Here are a few Christmas movies to watch.

Elf- 2003, Genre: Comedy

Elf is a Christmas movie directed by Jon Favreau and written by David Berenbaum that stars the amazing Will Ferrell. The movie is directed toward people of all ages. Sophomore Munil Ana believes this is one of the best Christmas movies he’s ever watched. “Elf will always be one of my favorites because the pacing of the movie is good and the comedy fits people of any age, not only that but Will Ferrell fits the role of Buddy the Elf perfectly and the rest of the cast fit pretty well”. Will Ferrell plays the role of Buddy the Elf who is accidentally sent to the North Pole as a child and is raised by the rest of Santas Elf. Buddy feels like he doesn’t fit in with the other Elfs so he takes the initiative to move to New York City to find his real father. During Buddy’s search, he tries many things to fit in with the people of New York such as trying to work a job this doesn’t turn out well with Buddy causing problems. One of the best senses comes when Buddy is in a park and gets snowballs thrown at him which causes an all-out war. As this is all going down Buddy throws a sidearm snowball throw that looks like something you’d see Patrick Mahomes do in the NFL. Directly after the sidearm throw as the opponent tries to run away Buddy throws an absolute dime to finish the fight. After this scene is where the movie loses one point in my rating. The movie after these moments starts to slow down in action and becomes more and more seemingly filler moments. Possibly the most iconic moment comes when Buddy ends up finding his way to Santa’s sleigh as he goes back to the north pole the movie cuts to a scene of his real father working his office job with a Buddy poster in his office. The overall humor, pacing, and Christmas feeling of the movie give it an overall rating of 9/10

Home Alone-1990, Genre: Comedy&Action

Home Alone is considered a Christmas movie by some and not by others such as Gaby Luke “Home Alone is a holiday movie you can watch any time of the year and is not just a Christmas time movie because of the overall plot” unlike him I believe overall the movie’s background and scenes give it the pass as a Christmas movie. Home Alone’s plot surrounds a young boy Kevin McCallister whose family left him during their trip to Paris. Kevin is enjoying his time alone until we are introduced to the “Wet Bandits” which are a duo of burglars who have been breaking into other homes in the neighborhood. Kevin tricks the Wet Bandits into thinking that his family is still home, forcing the Wet Bandits to delay their plans to rob the McCallister house which move gives Kevin time to set up traps for the robbers. Mid-flight Kevin’s mom realizes that they forget Kevin was home alone so she attempts to book a flight back home but the airport staff tells her that all the flights are reserved for the next two days already. Near the middle of the movie is when the most iconic scene starts. Kevin notices a member of the wet bandits trying to break into the home so he plays a scene from another movie that features a man talking to someone and then shooting a gun. As this happens Kevin lights firecrackers and laughs like a maniac as the member of the wet bandits gets scared away. Even after this happens they still don’t give up on the robbery. This is where the movie gets most of its high ratings from me at. One of the best traps is the icy stairs Kevin makes water spill all over the staircase due to the cold temperature of Chicago in the winter it freezes very quickly and the wet bandits take turns trying to get up the stairs but it just makes them look like penguins without any grip on the ice. Another one of the best traps was the flaming doorknob which was made by Kevin using a lighter to heat up a doorknob from the inside of a room as the burglars try to get in the room the red hot doorknob burns the skin off the burglar. At the end of the movie, Kevin’s family returns home and he doesn’t speak a word about what happened. In my opinion, this movie could have gotten a higher rating if the pacing at the begging wasn’t so slow. I feel like there could have been many moments of the movie left out and it all still would have flowed perfectly fine. Overall this movie gets a rating of 8.5/10.

A Christmas Story- 1983, Genre: Comedy

A Christmas story has a very simple plot and is something that would happen in real life. The main character a young boy named Ralphie Parker is narrating his childhood Christmas memory from when he was the age on 9. Ralphie remembers how the only thing he wanted for Christmas was a BB gun a Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot Range Model air rifle to be specific. He begs everyone possible for this including his mom, dad, and Santa. Ralphie’s mom tells him that he would “shoot his eye out” if he ever got the gun. Marc Benz believes this is the most memorable moment in the movie “the moment I best remember about the movie is the debate with his mom about the present he wants”. I agree with him here because the moment is basically building up the whole main plot of the movie. Despite opening all the presents on Christmas day Ralphie doesn’t get the gun he so much hoped for, until his dad points him to a present sitting in the corner which ended up containing the BB gun he so hoped for. Ralphie goes out to his backyard and shoots the gun, but this is when he shoots a metal sign which ends up reflecting the bullet right back at in hitting his glasses. Later on, he lies to his mom and tells her a ceiling fell on him which is why his glasses broke, and she ends up believing him and this is basically the end of the movie. Overall the movie is just all-around decent to me but many people enjoy it and give it the “Christmas classic” such as Junior Xavier DeMarco “I like a Christmas story because it tells a timeless story of youth and fun with mature humor”. I believe if the movie was a little bit shorter it could have gotten a higher rating me but the whole movie just feels a little bit slow to me with very little action or development taking place. Overall I give this movie a rating of 7.5/10.