Happy POLLidays! (Happy POLLidays!) It's the ILX Holiday Movies Poll Results Thread

(At least a couple of the Henson-era xmas entertainments (Emmet Otter and Christmas Eve on Sesame Street) aren't just at the top of my holiday viewing lists but are also among my all-time favorite cultural objects. So those are some big shoes.)

Christmas Carol is probably the only post-henson muppet thing that I really rate

I rate Muppets Most Wanted pretty highly tbh, probably even higher than Christmas Carol.

https://cansesclasseled.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/22.la_grande_illusion.jpg

22. LA GRANDE ILLUSION
Jean Renoir, France, 1937
(234 points, 4 votes)

https://cansesclasseled.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/21.thin_man.jpg

21. THE THIN MAN
W.S. Van Dyke, USA, 1934
(260.5 points, 5 votes, 1 first-place vote)

i like to watch at least one thin man movie every january during TCM's yearly blitz

as i've said, pictured scene is ideal Christmas morning

I've not seen this, but I love the novel!

i got a thin man box set and watched a bunch of them out of order, and theyre so similar that i completely lost track of which ones i have and havent seen, so to make sure i havent missed any ive got no recourse but to just watch through them all in order... not a bad problem to have

Only 21? ILX I am disappoint. (I cast that first-place vote.) The movie is toned down from the book, but I think it hits the sweet spot between hard-boiled crime drama (facing down increasingly more effective efforts to enforce the Hays Code) and the incoming screwball comedy genre.

As for La Grande Illusion, I'm pleased that people beside me remembered the Christmas element.

much of La Grande Illusion took place in winter, but it had only one actual Christmas scene! Still, it’s a great film, and was on my list

https://cansesclasseled.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/20.mon_oncle_antoine.jpg

20. MON ONCLE ANTOINE
Claude Jutra, Canada, 1971
(261 points, 5 votes)

QUEBEC REPRESENT

Great film, delighted it showed up here.

https://cansesclasseled.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/19.carol_.jpg

19. CAROL
Todd Haynes, USA, 2015
(263 points, 5 votes)

who wants to share creamed spinach, poached eggs, and a couple martinis with me?

Mon Oncle Antoine pretty much a perfect film imho

https://cansesclasseled.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/18.brazil.jpg

18. BRAZIL
Todd Haynes, UK-USA, 1985
(263.5 points, 5 votes)

damn Todd Haynes the MVP of this poll

Always wondered why Brazil seemed so Sirk-inspired. Shoulda read the credits!

Yeah yeah yeah...

We tease because we love.

Of the films from these results that I'm fairly familiar with, I have no memory whatsoever of the holiday elements in at least like half of them.

https://cansesclasseled.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/17.black_xmas.jpg

17. BLACK CHRISTMAS
Bob Clark, Canada, 1974
(295 points, 5 votes, 1 first-place vote)

so haynes, burton, and (i'm assuming) bob clark are going to get two appearances... anybody else likely?

woulda said Black but Kiss Kiss should be highest

watched black christmas for the first time for this poll and didnt love it, but i think i'm just over enjoying 'procedural horror' slasher movies like this - the most interesting parts for me were the scenes showing what it actually looks like (used to anyway) tracing a call, the guy physically running up and down the rows of exchanges in some phone company machine room. Dont think i'd ever seen that depicted in a movie before, pretty neat

Black Christmas is an odd movie, but I find its quirks to be endearing & it ranked high on my list. It's arguably the prototypical slasher film, though the tropes of that subgenre were very much cast by Halloween (which Carpenter modeled heavily on BC, structurally at least), so it seems strangely anachronistic within the context of its own cultural significance.

i remarked on the noms thread, it was pretty fun seeing the Big Twist at the end and realizing that must have been the first time that now-cliche idea was used

Black Christmas is absolutely ice-cold and I love it.

Black Christmas is everything I want in a horror pic: funny, creepy, genuinely haunting and yet fun in a way that keeps it from being too grim or depressing. Also, a cast that includes Margot Kidder, Andrea Martin and Doug McGrath from Goin’ Down the Road—a trifecta of 70s Canadian awesomeness!

c/d - the bumbling keystone cops in BC. I go back and forth on this.

Black Christmas is fine but, like The French Connection, its bones have been picked clean by the subgenre that it spawned.

i remarked on the noms thread, it was pretty fun seeing the Big Twist at the end and realizing that must have been the first time that now-cliche idea was used

yes, totally! I think it was the first time this idea was used in a film, possibly inspired by the real life murder of Janett Christman? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_babysitter_and_the_man_upstairs

it says right there: Foster's Release (1971)

granted that wasn't a feature film

Foster's Release is a 1971 American short film of 14 minutes directed by Terence H. Winkless... In Illinois, it is commonly shown to classes in home economics for whom it illustrates the concepts of responsibility and deviancy.

BC was my #1, "ice cold" is right. Anyone see the allegedly feminist 2nd remake?

Wow, reading that Fosters Release stars Dan Obannon, writer of Alien, and directed by the guy who played Bingo the Gorilla in the Banana Splits!

unsung pioneers, the lot of them!

new Black Christmas is fantastic, and "allegedly feminist" is insultingly reductive given the actual content and its extremely specific connection to real world events

ok!

wouldn't want to be flippant about a movie I haven't seen that features a specific connection to real-world events :)

SEE THAT U DON'T

anyway it's good but now that Star Wars is out, all the multiplexes in town have dropped it to one screening a day

Sorry for the delay before today's final entry ...

https://cansesclasseled.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/16.tangerine.jpg

16. TANGERINE
Sean Baker, USA, 2015
(300 points, 6 votes)

u guys really like recent overrated films

I'm not qualified to comment on this film, but thank you for completing the day's posting. I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm going to have a drink.
https://66.media.tumblr.com/d72f70f3edf56a8650d04b7f6309715c/tumblr_ndtiwkGMeI1qdm4tlo2_r1_500.gifv

I loved Tangerine

I am also a sap who voted for tangerine, a pretty good xmas movie. Thanks Eric H and Pillbox!

regarding Foster's Release, there is very scant info online about it, and it is not on youtube (neither is Judson's Release, which it is also known by). It's unclear how it would have found itself onto the radar of Bob Clark, but it seems likely that it did play a formative role in Carpenter's ideas for Halloween:

The crown jewel of the program is a short by Winkless and Lorimore and starring O’Bannon entitled Judson’s Release. Made in 1971, Judson’s Release is the blueprint for films such as Halloween, Black Christmas, He Knows You’re Alone and countless others, and O’Bannon’s relentless and emotionless portrayal of the killer resembles Jason, Michael Myers and many other film killers who would follow.

http://uschefnerarchive.com/project/shock-value-the-movie/

xp - l'chaim!

https://media.giphy.com/media/3ohfFuPQGsvqepOJBm/giphy.gif