Great to see a shout out to Trading Places, absolutely one of the most legendary comedies of the 1980s, and that says quite a lot. Ackroyd and Murphy were at their best, and Ralph Bellamy and Don Amici made the most inconic 'rich old bad duo' of all time. Great list all around!
My only Christmas movie tradition is the 1951 Alistair Sim Scrooge/A Christmas Carol. Never miss it. Everything else rotates in and out. My only other tradition, after 30+ years in retail, is putting on my Punk Rock Christmas CD, as an antidote.
I enjoy The Black Hole during the holiday season most every year. It released at that time of the year and it's very nostalgic for me. Just watched it today.
I always liked The Avengers episode Too many Christmas Trees because of the very clever reference to Cathy Gale sending a Christmas card to Steed from Fort Knox as a reference to the real Honor Blackman being in the Bond film Goldfinger.
And the Christmas movie I always recommend is Satoshi Kon's Tokyo Godfathers(2003). It's the story of three homeless people who find a baby abandoned in the trash and take it upon themselves to reunite the baby with its parents. It takes place between Christmas and New Year's.
My Christmas movies: It's A Wonderful Life (1946) A Christmas Story (1983) A Christmas Carol (1984) National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989) A Christmas Carol (1999) The Polar Express (2004) That's it. I don't have time for more.
Excellent video as always. It’s “A Christmas Story” for me. It has the universal appeal of a boy’s lust for a BB gun (air rifle); and as I get older the more I appreciate Darren McGavin’s performance. It didn’t make your list but I appreciate the shout out quick glimpse of it.
My favorite annual holiday watch is The Night They Saved Christmas, which now that I think about it seems like it would be right in your channels wheelhouse of earnestly made 80s cheese. Jaclyn Smith and her children are taken by an elf played by Paul Williams to meet Art Carney’s Santa Claus, and learn that Smith’s husband’s arctic blast drilling oil operation is dangerously close to leveling North Pole City. Check it out, I’d love you see your take on it!
"cause I'm a New York cop". We knew that it was coming, but that was some sublime sardonic humour squashed in there! And 'Christmas Vacation' for my vote.
For me, Channel 4's Father Christmas is the only staple, though the Muppets Christmas Special was a feature for a long time. (Turns out those VHS tapes of the original form are really hard to come by now? And many branches of my family have them.) Otherwise, I like to try different things each year, if I can.
Prometheus is set at Christmas. I've not seen it for a few years but from what I remember, Idris Elba dresses up as Santa and Charlize Theron sits on his knee. But like I say, it's been a while...
A definite Christmas viewing event is the Christmas episode of Sliders. The team go to a world where people are enslaved to credit card debt. The episode takes place in a mall. Can't get better than this!
The de facto Christmas movie for the UK back in the late 60's to early 80's was The Great Escape (1963). Despite having nothing to do with Christmas, the BBC would play it religiously, every year on Christmas Day afternoon!
Great little list. I remember back when Die-Hard = Christmas wasn't even a discussion. I honestly never remembered it being set at Christmas at all for years. I see it as an action movie set at Christmas. I always thought if they set it on the 04th July it would have worked just as well. Hey-ho. For me it's 'A Christmas Story', the 'Anne of Green Gables' TV series and the TV movie 'Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus'.
If it's set at Xmas, then it's a Christmas movie! :) A movie where Rambo wipes out half the population of North Korea with a half brick, would be a Christmas movie if it happens in late December. I'm going to rewatch Trading Places this Xmas....
This year I'll be rewatching "Cash on Demand", the 1961Hammer film about a bank robbery on 23 December starring Peter Cushing. I'll also be rewatching Peter Cook's "A Life in Pieces", originally shown on BBC 2 across the 12 Days of Christmas in 1990/1991.
A Christmas Story is perhaps too on the nose, but it's the closest I'd get to a Christmas movie. Even so, I don't remember the last time I watched it. Maybe getting into the mood isn't something I need, it's enduring... Although, I guess if pressed, the one single thing I like and I'm in the mood for at any time is Charlie Brown's Christmas Special :)
One of my favourite Christmas films is Battle of the Bulge from 1965. There's lots of snow and it's set during the festive season as you can hear the general ordering turkey for the troops so it's deffo a Xmas movie.
Die hard is overrated. It's a good action movie, nothing more, but it's lasting relevance is purely down to men being able to say it's their favourite Christmas movie.
Here's the thing about Will Farrell: he's part of a team of SNL comedians that, unlike previous generations, I only figured out if I liked them or not when they got OFF SNL and did movies. SNL initially taught me that not only did I loathe all of them, but that I would likely end myself if I were trapped in a room with any one them for more than five minutes. Then, they got out of there and, when given a script like Elf or The Wedding Singer, Will Farrell and Adam Sandler could be genunely funny and tolerable; and after a scripts like The Master of Disguise or The Love Guru, I realized I'm just fine without Dana Carvey or Mike Myers in live action. Back when it was perfectly reasonable to like films from people you think you wouldn't like as a human being.
The classic rule of a Christmas movie is that the plot is resolved through the, admittedly nebulous, "Magic of Christmas." People like to be belligerent but we all know what this means. Die Hard and Home Alone could be stripped of all Christmas references and still be essentially the same movie. Try that with Miracle on 34th Street.
I despise "Love Actually". It's more like a science-fiction film than anything else; in other words, life doesn't actually work like that in our reality/universe, so perhaps it does in another, apart from the version in the mind of the creator of the film.
I dislike the movie so much that I had to look up which character was portrayed by Billy Bob Thornton (who really should be portraying Victor von Doom, IMNSHO)!
If you would like to watch the ultimate thought provoking Christmas movie, then watch ‘Joyeux Noel (Merry Christmas)’ set on a Christmas Day in early World War One…
You missed out Hardware (1990). On the surface it's about a killer robot in a post-apocalyptic dystopia, but the whole plot of the film revolves around Mo coming to visit his girlfriend and having to get her a last minute Christmas present "Merry Christmas girlfriend, bought you the head of a killer robot." Hijinks and shenanigans ensue. Christmas movie.
Well I checked out the UK Xmas telly guide in advance once again. Nothing new. No big movies on xmas day like Bond, Star Wars, Supe or Indy or BTTF. Even the Kung Fu Panda franchise is fast waning as is Paddington.
Die Hard was NOT a Christmas movie because it was not released during the holiday season! What? Hang on... *checks IMDB* Miracle on 34th St...initially released in theaters on... THE 4th OF JULY?!?!?!?!?!?!? Oh crap. I give up.
Great to see a shout out to Trading Places, absolutely one of the most legendary comedies of the 1980s, and that says quite a lot. Ackroyd and Murphy were at their best, and Ralph Bellamy and Don Amici made the most inconic 'rich old bad duo' of all time. Great list all around!
Stam Fine discussing Christmas movies. . The Christmas video I didn't know I needed. .but Did 😂😂
Dan Ackroyd in the rasta suit. Timeless.
Black Christmas has made into my seasonal viewing list in the last few years.
My only Christmas movie tradition is the 1951 Alistair Sim Scrooge/A Christmas Carol. Never miss it. Everything else rotates in and out. My only other tradition, after 30+ years in retail, is putting on my Punk Rock Christmas CD, as an antidote.
I enjoy The Black Hole during the holiday season most every year. It released at that time of the year and it's very nostalgic for me. Just watched it today.
I always liked The Avengers episode Too many Christmas Trees because of the very clever reference to Cathy Gale sending a Christmas card to Steed from Fort Knox as a reference to the real Honor Blackman being in the Bond film Goldfinger.
And the Christmas movie I always recommend is Satoshi Kon's Tokyo Godfathers(2003). It's the story of three homeless people who find a baby abandoned in the trash and take it upon themselves to reunite the baby with its parents. It takes place between Christmas and New Year's.
Our family tradition was to rewatch the extended Lord of the Rings trilogy over XMAS.
Trading Places and Die Hard definitely at the top of my list too ...
Die Hard is the ultimate Xmas move for people who hate Xmas I make my wife sit through it after I have been forced to endure elf.
Fantastic video. Looking forward to more Doctor Who videos.
No "Santa Claus vs the Martians"!
My Christmas movies:
It's A Wonderful Life (1946)
A Christmas Story (1983)
A Christmas Carol (1984)
National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989)
A Christmas Carol (1999)
The Polar Express (2004)
That's it. I don't have time for more.
Great work Stam Fine. I usually switch between watching Stalag 17, Where Eagles Dare and The Great Escape for some christmas eve action and adventure.
I do love to watch a Morecambe & Wise Christmas special on Christmas day. Gives me that nostalgia feels and still makes me laugh
Favourite Christmas Special? Gotta be the Thunderbirds episode: "Give or Take a Million". Just has the right vibes.
GOLLY JEE MR TRACEY
Bad Santa is top of my list. Cheers from Canada!
"3615 Code Pere Noel" (aka Deadly Games, 1989) - It’s like "Home Alone" but French, violent, and made one year earlier.
I don't think I've ever watched Elf...and the more I see of it the less I want to. Now Bad Santa...that's a good one
@blahmcblahface3965 meh
Alan Rickman is here 3 times without even Harry Potter.
The best Christmas Film of all time is Jaws The Revenge. I always cry at the end when the shark rescues the hostages from the Nakatomi Building.
It's not a bad choice for those who live in warmer, snowless climates. What other movie dares to show a balmy Christmas day?
Funny (as always)! Why no reference to the infamous Star Wars Christmas...er, Holiday Special?
this particular video looks at movies rather than TV specials, which, one day, who knows, might be the subject a separate video.
Excellent video as always. It’s “A Christmas Story” for me. It has the universal appeal of a boy’s lust for a BB gun (air rifle); and as I get older the more I appreciate Darren McGavin’s performance. It didn’t make your list but I appreciate the shout out quick glimpse of it.
It's National Lampoons Christmas vacation for me every Xmas eve.
Meh
Picking 1 or 2 movies from Trading Places, Scrooge, Scrooged, Die Hard, or Star Trek: Generations is all the Christmas movie I need per year
My favorite annual holiday watch is The Night They Saved Christmas, which now that I think about it seems like it would be right in your channels wheelhouse of earnestly made 80s cheese. Jaclyn Smith and her children are taken by an elf played by Paul Williams to meet Art Carney’s Santa Claus, and learn that Smith’s husband’s arctic blast drilling oil operation is dangerously close to leveling North Pole City.
Check it out, I’d love you see your take on it!
"cause I'm a New York cop". We knew that it was coming, but that was some sublime sardonic humour squashed in there! And 'Christmas Vacation' for my vote.
I always watch the Back to the Future triology on chrismas day..
Done so for 15 years now.
You are definitely in my top 10 favorite UA-cam channels.
The Father Ted xmas episode is a perrenial favourite in our house hold. Also, Love Actually is mega cringe
Agree with all your Christmas movie Cheer. Thanks for the special.
I want to know if "Jesus Christ Superstar" is an Easter movie. I do know that "The Hebrew Hammer" is a Chanukah movie, though.
For me, Channel 4's Father Christmas is the only staple, though the Muppets Christmas Special was a feature for a long time. (Turns out those VHS tapes of the original form are really hard to come by now? And many branches of my family have them.) Otherwise, I like to try different things each year, if I can.
I try to watch "The Thin Man" every season.
Another triumph! Great video.
Cheers Stamfine may you and your loved ones have a great Christmas and a very happy new year 😃👍🇬🇧
Prometheus is set at Christmas.
I've not seen it for a few years but from what I remember, Idris Elba dresses up as Santa and Charlize Theron sits on his knee. But like I say, it's been a while...
Die hard was described a few years ago as a panto movie which is what makes it a Christmas film
I watch Black Christmas (1976) every Christmas Eve… it’s an oddly cozy movie lol
National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, I think my dad spends the entire year waiting to watch it at Christmas.
Bushfire Moon is a great Australian Christmas movie we watch it every Christmas
A definite Christmas viewing event is the Christmas episode of Sliders. The team go to a world where people are enslaved to credit card debt. The episode takes place in a mall. Can't get better than this!
The de facto Christmas movie for the UK back in the late 60's to early 80's was The Great Escape (1963). Despite having nothing to do with Christmas, the BBC would play it religiously, every year on Christmas Day afternoon!
seriously? I love The Great Escape (1963) and I never knew that! you've just inspired me sir.
For me its Santa Claus the movie. Watch it every year.
That movie needs more respect...its literally magic
Black Christmas is a Christmas movie and I imagine The Thing is for those who live in the north of the world. Tommy has a Christmas scene.
All the times i seen trading places i have no idea what’s going on at the end of the film
Thank you for another great review and thank you for mentioning the British TV series "Wings" (1977-78) again.
Great little list. I remember back when Die-Hard = Christmas wasn't even a discussion. I honestly never remembered it being set at Christmas at all for years. I see it as an action movie set at Christmas. I always thought if they set it on the 04th July it would have worked just as well. Hey-ho.
For me it's 'A Christmas Story', the 'Anne of Green Gables' TV series and the TV movie 'Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus'.
The BBC production of Hogfather is one of my yearly joys this season 🎁
Same! Glad to see it get some love. Happy Hogswatch!
Klaus and Violent Night make our new list for mandatory watching.
Awesome as always Mr Fine, a perfect collection, although I wonder how you'd feel about swapping Home Aome for Bad Santa...
If It's a Wonderful Life qualifies as a Christmas movie, then so did Die Hard.
Batman returns is a Christmas movie
Shall you be doing a video on Christmas TV episodes/movies next, then?
possibly next year or maybe not.
happy Christmas pal
00:12:46 is _painfully_ funny !😂I shall watch that movie for christmas this year..... (never even heard of it, so..thanks)
HARDWARE is a Christmas movie. The entire plot revolves around a soldier returning home and giving his girlfriend a Christmas present.
Tim Allen definitely doesn't want to the watch The Santa Clause ever.
Batman Returns is my Christmas movie. Dark, cynical and perverse. Just like Christmas
Wait did you just list Dan Akroyd’s 80’s movies and forget Ghostbusters? Great vid though, other than that egregious omission.
If it's set at Xmas, then it's a Christmas movie! :)
A movie where Rambo wipes out half the population of North Korea with a half brick, would be a Christmas movie if it happens in late December.
I'm going to rewatch Trading Places this Xmas....
Brazil...?
I've always been a bit miffed that lethal weapon isn't considered a Christmas movie
This year I'll be rewatching "Cash on Demand", the 1961Hammer film about a bank robbery on 23 December starring Peter Cushing. I'll also be rewatching Peter Cook's "A Life in Pieces", originally shown on BBC 2 across the 12 Days of Christmas in 1990/1991.
A Christmas Story is perhaps too on the nose, but it's the closest I'd get to a Christmas movie. Even so, I don't remember the last time I watched it. Maybe getting into the mood isn't something I need, it's enduring... Although, I guess if pressed, the one single thing I like and I'm in the mood for at any time is Charlie Brown's Christmas Special :)
Star Wars Holiday Special 1978!
I respect your love of personal torture.
@ I watch every year these days.
The latest Star Wars show Skeleton Crew has a bunch of kids watching the holographic circus act from the Holiday Special.
12 Monkeys is the best Christmas movie in my opinion.
One of my favourite Christmas films is Battle of the Bulge from 1965. There's lots of snow and it's set during the festive season as you can hear the general ordering turkey for the troops so it's deffo a Xmas movie.
So no one else considers "Edward Scissorhands" a Christmas movie??
👍🎄
Die hard is overrated. It's a good action movie, nothing more, but it's lasting relevance is purely down to men being able to say it's their favourite Christmas movie.
Fraggle Rock's The Festival of the Bells is a Christmas episode I watch every year without fail
Here's the thing about Will Farrell: he's part of a team of SNL comedians that, unlike previous generations, I only figured out if I liked them or not when they got OFF SNL and did movies. SNL initially taught me that not only did I loathe all of them, but that I would likely end myself if I were trapped in a room with any one them for more than five minutes. Then, they got out of there and, when given a script like Elf or The Wedding Singer, Will Farrell and Adam Sandler could be genunely funny and tolerable; and after a scripts like The Master of Disguise or The Love Guru, I realized I'm just fine without Dana Carvey or Mike Myers in live action.
Back when it was perfectly reasonable to like films from people you think you wouldn't like as a human being.
Classic dr who season 23 trial of a timelord
On her ancestors secret service it even has a Xmas song
Uncle buck for me, there is snow in the movie...
Scrooge 1970. Santa Claus the movie 1985. 🥇 And I've started watching Fatman 2020 every year since it released
The classic rule of a Christmas movie is that the plot is resolved through the, admittedly nebulous, "Magic of Christmas." People like to be belligerent but we all know what this means. Die Hard and Home Alone could be stripped of all Christmas references and still be essentially the same movie. Try that with Miracle on 34th Street.
Best Xmas Films
1. Brazil
2. The Wild Geese
I despise "Love Actually". It's more like a science-fiction film than anything else; in other words, life doesn't actually work like that in our reality/universe, so perhaps it does in another, apart from the version in the mind of the creator of the film.
I dislike the movie so much that I had to look up which character was portrayed by Billy Bob Thornton (who really should be portraying Victor von Doom, IMNSHO)!
If you would like to watch the ultimate thought provoking Christmas movie, then watch ‘Joyeux Noel (Merry Christmas)’ set on a Christmas Day in early World War One…
For all those who don't think the first two Die Hard movies are not Christmas movies, I have John McClane tree ornament that would beg to differ.
You missed out Hardware (1990). On the surface it's about a killer robot in a post-apocalyptic dystopia, but the whole plot of the film revolves around Mo coming to visit his girlfriend and having to get her a last minute Christmas present "Merry Christmas girlfriend, bought you the head of a killer robot." Hijinks and shenanigans ensue. Christmas movie.
AND IT HAD A CAMEO OF LEMMY!
Female Trouble is a Christmas movie.
"Won't you join us in a carol before we open our gifts?" (Tuneless rendition of Silent Night ensues.)
@rikp 😂 'hey, I wonder what this could be, a fishing rod?'....rolls eyes.
You should add "Le Père Noël est une ordure"
Empire Strikes Back.
Cmon, no rare exports
Well I checked out the UK Xmas telly guide in advance once again. Nothing new. No big movies on xmas day like Bond, Star Wars, Supe or Indy or BTTF. Even the Kung Fu Panda franchise is fast waning as is Paddington.
Bad Santa or Christmas Evil.
First!
Die Hard was NOT a Christmas movie because it was not released during the holiday season!
What?
Hang on...
*checks IMDB*
Miracle on 34th St...initially released in theaters on...
THE 4th OF JULY?!?!?!?!?!?!?
Oh crap. I give up.
Low-blow on Chevy. He was first-in everything‼
This video has more Ads than a Christmas movie!!
Die Hard IS a Christmas movie.....bite me