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What’s your essential holiday viewing?

December 8th, 2009 · 40 Comments

Grinch

You guys. You guys. Tonight, the Cartoon Network is airing Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas. I think it was on network television last month, but since I’m not sure, I’m pretending that didn’t happen. Instead, I will consider this airing to be the one that counts. It’s the one that will officially launch my Christmas season.

Do you know what I mean? It just doesn’t  feel like the the holidays can begin until I’ve seen The Grinch. (And I’m talking about the classic cartoon, not the Jim Carrey movie or the Broadway musical.)

Now, watching The Grinch is more of a personal tradition. I can watch it by myself, even, and that’s okay. The rest of my essential holiday viewing, however, requires my family. Otherwise it doesn’t count.

Every year, my parents and I watch Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas. In case you don’t know, that’s a 1977 special that was created by Jim Henson and his stable of puppetry geniuses. It tells the story of Ma Otter and her son Emmet, poor river creatures who use love and music and an O. Henry-style twist to overcome poverty and have a very special Christmas. I cannot overstate this movie’s awesomeness. If you’ve seen it, then all I have to say is this: A mess of mama’s barbecue.

My family’s other viewing tradition began back in 1985, when I celebrated my seventh birthday by going with a group of my friends to see Santa Claus: The Movie at the theater. Now, the Blankenship clan fires it up every year.

Is this movie good? Um… no. Not really. There’s this subplot where a rebellious elf (Dudley Moore) runs away from the North Pole and joins forces with a ruthless businessman (John Lithgow) who wants to use the elf’s toy ideas to launch “Christmas 2.” Then a homeless boy and rich girl get involved, and… weird stuff happens. People eat magic lollipops that make them fly. Eighties hairdos seem to take on lives of their own.

The opening thirty minutes of Santa Clause: The Movie, however, are pretty magical. They explain how Santa Claus got selected for his job and how his magic works. There’s also a fun montage of “Christmas through the years,” in which Santa has to respond to things like the Industrial Age.

For a while, my family tried to watch the entire movie every year, but we never quite made it. We’d always fall asleep or take phone calls or suddenly remember there was some leftover ham that needed eating. So now, we basically just watch the first few scenes. Or, like, we’ll say we’re going to watch the whole thing, but we know we aren’t. In fact, we probably spend as much time discussing when we’ll watch the movie—Christmas Eve? Christmas Day? Next week?—as we do actually watching it. But at this point, that conversation feels as festive as the event itself.

So about how you guys? Do you have holiday viewing traditions? Are there things you watch by yourself, just to feel festive? Do you and your siblings spend every Christmas Eve watching old episodes of Huckleberry Hound? Do you know it’s Hanukkah when your dad pulls out the DVD of Aliens?

I want to know your stories. I’ll be free to read them anytime except tonight, between 8:00 and 8:30. That’s when I’ve got a date with Max, the reindeer dog.

Tags: Movies · Television

40 responses so far ↓

  • 1 Brianne // Dec 8, 2009 at 1:48 pm

    “White Christmas” always goes on the DVD as I put up the Christmas tree. (And we must be almost the exact same age because I turned seven just five days after Christmas 1985)

  • 2 Lora // Dec 8, 2009 at 1:52 pm

    “A Wish for Wings That Work”-Bloom County…I finally bought it on DVD after watching the taped VHS version for the past 4 years. I know! I’m old!
    “Love, Actually”
    “Scrooge” the awesome Albert Finney musical
    “A Christmas Story”
    “It’s a Wonderful Life”

    All must be watched during the season at my house.

  • 3 Erin Gould // Dec 8, 2009 at 1:53 pm

    ‘Die Hard’.

    Every Christmas Eve, the wife goes to bed, and I pop this sucker in and watch a beautiful story about overcoming adversity, life-threatening obstacles, all in the name of reclaiming the love one has for another person…with guns.

    I mean, c’mon, you’ve got great characters, great tension, great laughs, great action and more importantly, one of the best movie villains of all times — and all of it on Christmas Eve!

    And in the end, after all is said and done — when all of the grinches who wanted to steal Christmas (and hundreds of millions of dollars in bearer bonds) are done away with, John McClane, our Christmas Hero, walks out of Nakatomi Plaza to be reunited with the woman he traveled over 3,000 miles to be with, all under the snow fall of corporate paperwork…and they ride off in a limo to the soothing sounds of Vaughn Monroe’s ‘Let It Snow’. Ahhh…let’s see George Bailey try and pull THAT one off.

  • 4 Mark Blankenship // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:00 pm

    @Brianne — We are indeed almost the same age. My birthday is tomorrow (December 9.)

    @Lora — There’s a Bloom County Christmas movie? I’ve never even heard of it! I’m assuming it’s great.

  • 5 JenH. // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:02 pm

    I love (LOVE!) Christmas Vacation.

    Christmas without Christmas Vacation is like a JELL-O mold without kitty kibble.

  • 6 Karen // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:09 pm

    Man, you listed my husband’s two favorites: Emmet Otter and Santa Claus: The Movie–I HATE both of them! Fiery passion hatred. Well, I can tolerate Emmet Otter, but Santa Claus…no.

    Anyway, our traditional recent classics are Bad Santa and Elf. Elf is up for viewing on DVD this Saturday evening.

    From my childhood it was Charlie Brown Christmas all the way, which I know isn’t a movie, but it truly marked the start of the Christmas season for me when I watched in on TV growing up. Those Almond Joy sponsorship ads…

  • 7 katy // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:13 pm

    Actually my parents and sister and I really have always liked Home Alone at Christmas. In recent years we’ve rarely turned it on intentionally, but it’s pretty much always on TV around Christmas Day. And once we spot it, we pretty much always watch it.

    My dad laughs so hard at the slightly-sadistic “defending the house” sequence that we worry for his health. Those paint cans to the face? They never get old. And obviously they’re very festive. Paint cans to the face are the reason for the season. Or something like that anyway.

    I also am a real sucker for just about every version of A Christmas Carol, including the Muppet one and Scrooged. (I will say I’m leery of seeing this latest version, although I’m sure I will eventually.) I teach A Christmas Carol in my religion and consumer culture class, and we compare scenes from different versions … Scrooge’s final conversion scenes are SO effective and moving that they almost can’t be done badly.

    For a few years my sister and husband and I were liking the whole Lord of the Rings / Christmas connection, when we started getting those films on DVD at Christmas. We’d load up with snacks and watch the trilogy back to back. My sister took it as some kind of staying-in-your-pajamas-and-avoiding-getting-off-the-couch challenge. I could imagine restarting that tradition some time.

  • 8 Alice // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:14 pm

    I went on a childhood Christmas memory buying spree a few years ago, and got all my favourite classics on VHS or DVD.

    *A Garfield Christmas
    *A Claymation Christmas
    *Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer
    *Frosty the Snowman
    *The Grinch
    *A Charlie Brown Christmas

    I couldn’t say which I love most, but I have a real fondness for A Claymation Christmas, which we taped off TV in like 1987 and became a classic at our house.

  • 9 Alice // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:14 pm

    Oh! And Mickey’s Christmas Carol. The animated version. It’s a classic too.

  • 10 ferretrick // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:16 pm

    I don’t know if I’m more disappointed in Obama’s abysmal performance on gay issues so far or him preempting Charlie Brown Christmas last week. Bumping Charlie Brown for a speech about mobilizing troops? Do YOU know what Christmas is all about, Obama?

  • 11 Casey // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:21 pm

    My family used to watch “Goodfellas” every year on Christmas Day. And we’re not even Italian. Explains a lot, huh?

  • 12 mosprott // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:27 pm

    Christmas Vacation

    and

    SCROOGED! [Bill Murray, David Johannsen, Carol Kane & John Forsythe! AWESOME!]

  • 13 Amanda // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:40 pm

    A Christmas Story, which pretty much plays nonstop for the entire holiday season on my grandparents’ TV, and Love, Actually, which I usually watch by myself late at night while working on last-minute gifts.

    This year, Emmet Otter is going on the list. Also maybe Annabelle’s Wish, a film about a mute boy, a flying cow, and an evil rich aunt, narrated by none other than Randy Travis. I watched it in OK with my little cousins at T-giving, while they hid their faces because of the utter tragedies that befall the characters, one after another. The fire! The jewelry box! The talking animals! The mean neighbors! Then damned if one of my students didn’t mention it in class the other day as a tale with a wish motif. I had never heard of it before, then two mentions in a week. I think it’s a sign.

  • 14 Dustin L // Dec 8, 2009 at 2:58 pm

    Every year my sister and I must watch “A Muppet Family Christmas,” the 1987 special where all the muppets (including characters from Sesame Street and Fraggle Rock) crowd into Fozzie’s mother’s farmhouse. The sad thing is that, due to rights issues involving the music, this special has never had an uncut video release of any kind, and currently isn’t available at all. Fortunately my sister has a copy that a friend made for her (our original VHS was destroyed some years back), and I’ve now backed it up digitally too. We’re dedicated Muppet fans in my family.

    I also must watch “A Charlie Brown Christmas” and “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” every year. Usually, being an animation aficionado and also having multiple children in my extended family, I’ll end up seeing quite a few more old Christmas specials each year, but these are the essentials.

  • 15 Mark Blankenship // Dec 8, 2009 at 3:19 pm

    Alice, Mickey’s Christmas Carol is great. Several times a week, I find myself saying “With pis-mashios, with pis-mash, with pis-mash… with yogurt.”

    Also, it’s truth time. I have never seen National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. I’m not intentionally avoiding it or anything. I’ve just never seen it.

  • 16 Rube Goldberg // Dec 8, 2009 at 3:26 pm

    Thanks for the heads-up about Grinch. I missed it when it was on a week or so ago.

    My required viewing includes:

    *Pee-Wee’s Christmas Special – Camp up the wazoo, the only thing missing is John Waters.

    *A Very Brady Christmas – I always have that playing in the background when I’m wrapping gifts

    *Santa Claus (MST3K version) – This was a Mexican kids movie that featured Santa versus the Devil (uh, sure) with Merlin (??) helping to save the day.

  • 17 Rae // Dec 8, 2009 at 3:54 pm

    Man, now I want to go watch all of the movies listed above!!

    Love Actually is high on my list these days. National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation is also one of those must watches every year not to mention A Christmas Story… I watch that several times during the 24 hour marathon on TBS every single year.

    I love all the animated movies listed too and to them I sadly add Inspector Gadget‘s Christmas special. I don’t even know why I’m addicted to it but I have to watch it every year.

    I’d also add a bunch of TV show holiday episodes. I watch most of The OC Chrismakkuh episodes over again at this time of year plus a bunch of others from The Office, Gilmore Girls, Ally McBeal, etc.

  • 18 MattPatt // Dec 8, 2009 at 4:10 pm

    For me, it’s all about National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation and Gremlins. Possibly this indicates a high degree of holiday cynicism on my part, but I genuinely do appreciate that everyone in both films has a happy ending… even if they did survive, you know, a plague of demons o’er the land.

  • 19 Mark Blankenship // Dec 8, 2009 at 4:21 pm

    I’m with you on Gremlins, MAttPatt. I just ordered a copy with part of an Amazon gift card my parents sent me for my birthday. (Part of the card was also used on buying 50 of Reba McEntire’s greatest hits.)

  • 20 badkittyuno // Dec 8, 2009 at 4:39 pm

    My husband and I always watching the following every Christmas season (often more than once):
    * Home Alone 1& 2
    * Christmas Vacation (which is his favorite)
    * Love, Actually
    * The Santa Clause (which my dad loves & always watched with my sister & I when we were kids)
    and of course, Die Hard, which I ADORE

  • 21 jack // Dec 8, 2009 at 4:51 pm

    There are 3 specials and 3 movies I’ve been watching every year for a very long time.

    Bill and Opus A Wish For Wings That Work
    Year Without A Santa Claus
    A Charlie Brown Christmas

    A Nightmare Before Christmas
    The Bells of St Mary
    Scrooge (with Alastair Sim)

  • 22 Lee // Dec 8, 2009 at 5:41 pm

    It’s a Wonderful Life is my only MUST see every holiday season. Between “Merry Christmas, Bedford Falls!” and all the Baileys’ friends coming by with the money to save George and Harry’s homecoming…my eyes get misty just thinking about it!

  • 23 Tanya // Dec 8, 2009 at 5:53 pm

    My favorite Christmas movie is “Bernard and the Genie” w/ Rowin Atkinson. So much wacky Christmas hijinks!

    @ DustinL I would love for “A Muppet Family Christmas” to be released some day. I would dearly love to watch it with my daughter. “..there’s a Christmas party at the home of *Fozzy Bear*…”

  • 24 Madge // Dec 8, 2009 at 6:50 pm

    Okay, totally not a holiday film, but… a local art-film house used to show Spike & Mike’s Sick & Twisted Animation Festival every year on Christmas Eve. My brother and I would go every year (at least since he could drive us there, since no way were our parents going to subsidize this tradition). About 10 years ago, they stopped showing it. Not surprising, since Mike and I were among usually 5 other people who would go. And then the theatre closed, too. We still lament the passing of this tradition when we get together on Christmas Eve.

  • 25 Laura // Dec 8, 2009 at 7:04 pm

    Dustin, if your Muppet Family Christmas DVD fails, go to: http://www.kermiclownvideos.com/MuppetChristmas.htm

    That’s where I ordered my version and it is glorious. It’s definitely on my essentials list along with White Christmas and Pee Wee’s Christmas…Which I still need to get a copy of

  • 26 SDpfeiffy // Dec 8, 2009 at 7:27 pm

    Charlie Brown, because my mom nearly always brought home the saddest tree, and because I love it. Frosty, because I always cry, and my siblings would always tease me about it. Of course, now we’ve added A Christmas Story, although we hardly ever get to watch it straight through. Love Actually isn’t my favorite Christmas movie–it’s my favorite movie. So if it’s on, I will interrupt whatever I’m doing to watch the entire thing. (Maybe Santa will bring me the dvd this year-finally.)
    Our New Year’s Day is always filled with the Twilight Zone marathon.

  • 27 Melissa // Dec 8, 2009 at 7:44 pm

    Our faves are:

    - White Christmas
    - The Year Without a Santa Claus (a.k.a. The One With The Heat Miser/Snow Miser)
    - Miracle on 34th Street
    - It’s a Wonderful Life
    - How the Grinch Stole Christmas
    - Charlie Brown Christmas

    We own all of them on DVD, and between TV and DVD, we usually manage to at least dip into all of them between Thanksgiving and New Year’s.

  • 28 Niki // Dec 8, 2009 at 10:44 pm

    We always watch Garfield’s Christmas Special and the Claymation Christmas Special in that order (it was how they were aired when my family taped them–early 1990s, I believe (there are messages home from the troops during Desert Storm during the commercials).

    I particularly love Claymation Christmas, given its focus on Christmas carols (which I love) and its humor. (Here we come a waffling, along the leaves so green…)

  • 29 Michael // Dec 9, 2009 at 3:59 am

    I have the interesting situation of being largely alone in the house through the Christmas season and holidays, which leaves me very free of tradition. I can see no more or less than I choose, and tradition has no more weight than I choose to give it.

    Consequently, I don’t think I require or seek out any Christmas movies or TV specials (I have a CD or two I’ll always listen to). However–should I stumble across them, I will gladly catch (and would be sad to miss):

    the Friz Freleng animated Grinch (a gem of scale and proportion, unlike most treatments of Seuss following his demise)

    A Charlie Brown Christmas (also beautifully pulled off)

    Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (“Bumbles Bounce!”)

    And, like Katy, I’m something of a Christmas Carol obsessive; I will watch at least part of any version you could name, including the lackluster Kelsey Grammar one, the snarky Scrooged, and even the lumbering, overproduced mess-of-a-musical with Albert Finney. And I also like the GOOD Christmas Carols: Alistair Sim’s, George C. Scott’s (my favorite); not sure how I feel about Patrick Stewart’s, except that I admire the closeness to the book.

    And there are two little-knowns I’ll add:

    Mr. Scrooge’s Christmas Carol, really surprisingly good for a children’s animated treatment, and

    Blackadder’s Christmas Carol, a great way to blow the treacly Dickensian sentiment out the door (“Mrs. Scratchit” is a howling, manipulative guilt-machine, demanding money with which to feed a “Tiny Tom” who is about thirty, easily ambulatory, and hugely fat).

    Now I have to put on those CDs.

  • 30 Amy // Dec 9, 2009 at 11:49 am

    Put me down as another who plays the VHS of _A Muppet Family Christmas_ every year. We also have _A Claymation Christmas_ on that tape, and I just love the walruses ice skating, among other skits! The others are pretty standard along what others have said, but it’s important to me to watch _Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town_ and _Twas the Night Before Christmas_ to truly remember my excited young self on Christmas Eve. I loved that Santa’s wife’s name was Jessica (a dear friend’s name at the time) and little Albert Mouse fixing the bells to ring always gives me goosebumps.

  • 31 Deanna // Dec 9, 2009 at 12:45 pm

    Must see Charlie Brown every year! And always want, and try my hardest, to see A Christmas Story, Holiday Inn, It’s A Wonderful Life, Christmas Vacation and The Grinch (cartoon.)

  • 32 Michael // Dec 9, 2009 at 3:32 pm

    I also wanted to mention a regional fave from my Rocky Mountain days: “Christmas Snows,Christmas Winds,” which used to play every Christmas in the Utah region. Story of a man remembering all the great things about his childhood Christmases–and, painfully, a childish prank he played that hurt a little girl who was an outsider, and his helpless regret in the midst of all the memories of pies and presents and jolly Old St. Nicholas. Full disclosure: my ex produced it; I had nothing to do with it, but remain moved by and proud of it.

  • 33 Krista // Dec 9, 2009 at 6:35 pm

    All my favorites are already mentioned:
    Mickey’s Christmas Carol
    The Grinch
    Rudolph

    But I have to add tv movies. I love to watch “A Diva’s Christmas Carol” or whatever it’s called with Vanessa Williams and “All I want for Christmas” with Jamey Sheridan and young Ethan Embry and even youger Thora Birch.

  • 34 Rube Goldberg // Dec 10, 2009 at 9:03 am

    For anyone interested in seeing Pee Wee’s Christmas Special (it’s not available on Netflix yet), you can see it streaming here. Woo!

  • 35 Lora // Dec 10, 2009 at 2:13 pm

    It’s not a movie, it was an animated special that aired on CBS. Dustin Hoffman and Robin Williams had a uncredited small roles. My favorite line… “Rhinoceros!”

  • 36 Stephie // Dec 11, 2009 at 12:37 pm

    Gremlins.

    I also have a 4th of July movie tradition – Coming to America. 5 years and counting.

  • 37 Collin H // Dec 16, 2009 at 1:10 pm

    About the only Christmas tradition my family still honors is an annual viewing of Opus’ and Bill’s A Wish For Wings That Work.

    Cause in my family, nothing says Xmas like Crossdressing Cockroaches in Crisis.

  • 38 Rebecca // Dec 16, 2009 at 6:35 pm

    Our tradition, when my sisters and I were younger, was to watch “Christmas Eve on Sesame Street” while decorating the tree. Would Oscar learn the true meaning of Christmas this year? Would Big Bird ever find out how big, fat Santa Claus fit down that itty, bitty chimney? And would he freeze his gibblets off this year? For a while after our Beta version failed and we didn’t have a VHS player, we had to make do with the soundtrack (on record, no less). Now, my sisters and I all have DVD backups just in case :)

    We still turn on It’s A Wonderful Life on Christmas Eve afternoon – we don’t necessarily sit down and watch it, but we can wander in and out of the TV room and know it’s on. And Christmas Day is usually reserved for Pixar movie marathons, even if it’s Finding Nemo or WALL-E several times in a row.

  • 39 Jessica K // Dec 19, 2009 at 5:09 pm

    You know I’m quite partial to that Grinch guy… for many reasons. :)

  • 40 Jessica K // Dec 19, 2009 at 5:10 pm

    Oh, btw Home Alone and National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation are musts. I’ve never seen “It’s a Wonderful Life” because I’m a terrible no good very bad person.

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