Jeff Black's Holiday 'Flick O' The Week

[jeffradon2000]

yep that one there looks pretty great, brian, right up my alley

This last weekend I watched 2 amazing versions of the Christmas Carol

 

I know it's really hard to pick which one of these timeless classics is the best so I just watched both.

I actually did not grow up watching the muppets one, I have only been watching it the last few years. It's certainly a treat and probably the best muppets movie out there. I think I might have ruined the muppets for myself because when I watched this movie 5 years ago, and then watched their other movies which weren't nearly as good. But I would say overall I probably don't need to go into detail on this one as we all know this one by heart. This just may be my favorite Christmas movie.
5/5

Scrooged, featuring Bill Murray actually scared me as a kid with its dark lighting and when I was flipping through channels I landed on the scene with the ghost of christmas future. Now that I've watched it again, it's definitely a Bill Murray vehicle where he just kind of goes around being Bill Murray sort of acting as a character but also just being Bill Murray. Everything follows the general Christmas Carol formula and all the classic characters have different spins. I find it humorous that Bill Murray's character has a brother in the movie that is played by Bill's actual brother. Miles Davis has a cameo, and I especially enjoy the characters played by David Johansen, Bobcat goldthwait, and Carol Kane.  If that doesn't scream 80s then I don't know what does. This kind of makes me want to go back and watch one of my favorite 80s movies again, One Crazy Summer. We've been sitting on the sountrack at the store for this for over a year and I was kind of curious as to why this movie needed a soundtrack released to vinyl. There is one Al Green song that is featured prominently but I think that's about it.
4/5

I guess you could say that I'm a big Scrooge head as I expect on Christmas eve as I'm drinking my bourbon and setting up the train around the tree, I'll be watching the 1951 Christmas Carol that I was forced to endure as a child every Christmas eve, but now have a special fondness for.

[jeffradon2000]

Here are my last 4 holiday movies for the season, feels like I didn't get to as many this year but at least finished strong with 2 of my all time favorites

   

Someday I need to figure out how to resize images

Santa Claus The Movie - No, not the Tim Allen one, this is the real thing in my book. Nothing like a good earnest take on the Santa mythos with all the origin story of how exactly everything works (except how do they get a seemingly endless supply of wood to build everything, also no one better light a match in Santa's workshop). We understand how reindeer fly (not just Christmas spirit, sorry Elf). We know how Santa can do everything (magic I guess) and that perhaps santa is actually a zombie or some sort or ghost as he presumably dies in the beginning of the movie. Also the oldest elf is actually Burgess Meredith and has the longest beard in the world as it takes 6 or so elves to carry it. I will say the first half of the movie is a lot better than the 2nd. This is the first movie I remember seeing in the theatre. It was being shown at the movie theatre in Casey which I believe folded shortly after. I also remember bits and pieces of the marketing around the movie being everywhere and distinctly entering into coloring contests for the movie at a local business in Casey. The second half of the movie tries to move on from the really long and epically detailed origin story to the present day (1980s) where there is mcdonalds and coca cola. The bad guy played by John Lithgow is excruciatingly over the top and of course in true late 70s/early 80s fashion there is a twist that some of the central characters are actually related!  In the end Santa saves the day by performing a stunt that he's never been able to do, and against all odds, I just don't understand why he has to do it rather than just use his magical teleport abilities or something. At any rate this movie is very 80s and very cheesy but I love it as it gives me the nostalgia tingles, especially if I skip a couple years before watching it again. And the best part was both my boys were glued to the screen the entire time so now this has formed the foundation of the Santa mythos for them as well.
4/5

Christmas Carol (1951) - this is the one I was forced to watch every Christmas eve, and I hated it. It was so boring, everyone talks like they're from 200 years ago or something and I can't understand half of what they're saying. Well that's what I thought then, but after the conditioning in my formative years, I love this version of the Christmas carol, but my wife hates it. Her take is it's too dramatic, like they're performing on a stage like a musical, which is probably a decent take. Since being married I haven't really watched it until the last few years. Since I stay up late to setup all the packages and the train around the tree on Christmas eve, I pour a glass of bourbon and pop this into the dvd player. It still gives me the nostalgia tingles every time. I love Alaster Sim's performance, he certainly conveys Scrooge's transformation very well, and by the end he's showing old man moves you never thought possible.
5/5

White Christmas
Another classic flick. This would have been too boring for me when I was a kid and my parents didn't make me watch it. Cat loves this and it was our tradition before having kids to watch this together on Christmas eve with a bottle of wine. This year we watched it Christmas day in the evening while the kids were running around with their new toys (or sitting absorbed into their new video games). It's kind of a romanticization of another era, an era that now sits in our dollar bins and might be a bit overly white. Still I grew up listening to Bing Crosby every Christmas and even tho I'm not a big musical person, I can appreciate this. It's a good movie to sit down and watch with your sweetheart.
4/5

Elf
I assume Elf is the biggest modern classic of our time. It certainly is lodged pretty squarely into the Christmas Canon unlike maybe Jingle All The Way or 1998's Jack Frost. Instead of trying to do another take at the Santa origin story, we're trying to make another Rudolph spinoff only with an elf this time who is different than everyone else. Starring our favorite Christmas couple Will Ferrell and Zooey Deschanel, who seem like such the perfect pair in real life. A lot of good Christian people fell in love with Zooey in this movie and were tragically scandalized by the sexual themes portrayed in New Girl. I've seen this enough times now that I didn't really need to watch the movie, I mainly was playing with the boys while it was on. It's still fine to watch with a nice heartwearming saving Christmas scene at the end. 
3/5

[bennybuzzkill]

Im ready for more of your picks, Jeff...

can 8-bit Christmas be one this year?

or how about the Christmas Story 2 that is coming out?

or what about the action-santa movie with the guy from stranger thing?

[jeffradon2000]

I'm probably just going going to watch all the same movies as last year, minus that 2021 home alone movie, and probably not home alone 2 either.

I've already watched nightmare, old grinch and charlie brown already. My 8yo son thinks the new grinch movie is much better.

[bennybuzzkill]

Okay but Jeff what about a Chrismtas Story Christmas
(now streaming on HBO Max) ?

[brain galacki]

okay but what about this christmas classic movie club??

the part where he unplugs the plug and all of the lights in the city go out a galecki family classic!

[jeffradon2000]

I've been so busy selling and delivering pinball machines lately that I haven't been keeping up on Christmas show watching. However I got a hot tip from Facebook that the Muppet Family Christmas TV special is available in full on Youtube! I'm definitely going to be watching it once a get a free moment this week. I don't think I have ever watched this!

[jeffradon2000]

Since my whole family has covid and isolating in the other side of the house, that put a stop to watching any holiday movies together.

I did happen to notice this in my feed. I only watch heart warming family movies but I bet you sickos will want to see this