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

The conspicuous contrarianism of picking such tedious obscurities as Home Alone, Miracle on 34tn St, A Muppet Christmas Carol, Elf, A Christmas Tale, National Lampoons Christmas Vacation as among the great holiday movies of all time. Rmde indeed.

Spoiler Alert: #1 is A Serbian Film

“None of the major canonical Christmas films have come up in spots 40 through 16... what a dumb poll”

blow it out your chimney

I was in my late 20s when Home Alone came out. I never saw it, because why would any single adult, ever?

Veg if none of your ballot of twenty have placed yet, maybe 3/4 of them will place on Monday (or whenever Eric is finishing)

Christmas Vacation should've been higher but didn't vote, won't moan. Whoever said Batman Returns is the only good comicbook movie ever is entirely correct, also another RIP Tim Burton moment.

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I think I'll hack away at #11-15 over the next couple days, leaving the top 10 for Monday.

34. Home Alone
Watching this as an adult, I noticed Hughes's excellect plotting. Everything in the last 20 minutes is meticulously set up. The doc on netflix is worth a watch too. also jack saint's recent youtube video on the movie's awful politics.

29. Elf
I love the north pole beginning, but then the family drama is a failure, and the ending isn't connected to anything else. James Caan and his character just don't work.

28. Christmas Vacation
Hughes's 50s nostalgia and class unconsciousness are front and center. It still has some good jokes, especially with the aunt and uncle towards the end. As an adult my favorite scene is the short discussion between Clark Griswold and his father.

23. Muppet Christmas Carol
I nominated this just so no one would complain about its absence. I think it was the weakest Muppet movie made up to that point.

21. The Thin Man
rewatched it this month. Two great characters right at the center, but nothing else works. great screengrab choice btw, that's my favorite scene.

As an adult my favorite scene is the short discussion between Clark Griswold and his father.

This and the scene Clark locked in the attic tearing up over old Christmas tapes are lovely, quietly moving moments inserted into the antic comedy without jarring the tone of the thing at all. For all of its TV-ish direction (I want to skip the sledding sequence every time, but this is one of those rare films that I never watch alone), there's a light touch to it that is all Hughes.

that youtube video i mentioned wasn't by jack saint, it was this one: https://youtu.be/9Pa8bRdDyW4

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15. TRADING PLACES
John Landis, USA, 1983
(337.5 points, 6 votes, 1 first-place vote)

Hughes's 50s nostalgia and class unconsciousness

Yes, this, very very this.

Nothing is more edifying to me than seeing the same list of canonical films over and over in a slightly different order each time so I find these results disappointing

I think I'll hack away at #11-15 over the next couple days, leaving the top 10 for Monday

A+ advent calendar simulation

One of the first movies I remember playing non-stop on cable. Definitely seen it in chunks over the years; dunno if I've ever actually sat down to watch it straight through (Three Amigos and Coming to America were my Landis jams).

my mum showed this film to me repeatedly because it has the line "I've got enough problems, Louie"

yeah, had a strong familiarity with this from cable before i ever watched it beginning to end.for a long period of my life i knew most or all of the various scenes and sequences, but wasnt 100% clear on what order they were supposed to go in

i had early little kid hetero-awakening lust for jamie lee curtis via trading places; can't have been older than 11

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14. THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS
Henry Selick, USA, 1993
(348 points, 7 votes)

I watches Trading Places last night. Surprisingly homophobic even for an 80s movie.

Apologies for getting overwhelmed yesterday. It's a lucky top 13 today starting now!

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14. A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Brian Desmond Hurst, UK, 1951
(360 points, 6 votes)

I wish more movies aped Nightmare Before Christmas' swift pacing/runtime

wow thought '51 Christmas carol would be top ten for sure

mum just asked why there is only one marley brother in this bbc adaptation of a christmas carol, correctly assuming that muppets christmas carol is the original text

— claire biddles (@msclairebiddles) December 22, 2019

Just been discussing Sim v George C Scott. Love both tbh

The last two were both in my top 5 - I grew up watching ACC 51 with my parents every year & the ghost of Christmas future haunted my dreams a child, so I had to include a reference to that in the screencap. ANBC is a unique reframing of timeless mythologies, and also the high watermark for modern stop-motion animation imo (tho the Laika films give it a run for its money).

Selick wrote and directed Coraline for Laika, though (and then signed an exclusive contract with Disney to do stop motion films for them, all of which they've currently canned)

The award-winning short Moongirl for Laika, too.

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12. EYES WIDE SHUT
Stanley Kubrick, USA-UK, 1999
(372.5 points, 7 votes)

I must say the soundstage element lends a creepy snowglobe aesthetic that makes it feel more Christmassy than the text would suggest

Well put! I really wish I’d managed to see this in the cinema when it came around earlier this month

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11. BAD SANTA
Terry Zwigoff, USA, 2003
(381 points, 7 votes)

I should see this sometime.

I saw Eyes Wide Shut in Perth, WA, having smoked some very strong weed. It's probably the most intense cinema experience I've ever had and I'm basically scared to watch it again.

Too low, srsly

If i'd've got it together to vote i'd've put Bad Santa top 5. First place would feel wrong but it's great and a necessary corrective to schmaltz and still engaged with the double feeling of the sociopolitical concept of Christmas in a way that a bunch of these films aren't really.

yes, it’s extremely “about” Christmas, in multiple ways

I haven't seen any of 2003's three now-beloved Xmas movies (the third of which I'm going to assume won't place here).

Part of the initial appeal of it for me was that it felt like it came out of nowhere, in that I was expecting more along the lines of other “Bad ___” films — this Santa is outrageous! He smokes and swears! And what I got was one of those ultra-hardboiled comedies that is nearly impossible to get right (I think Shane Black’s the nice guys is another, tho I’d need to rewatch to see just how right it gets it)

RIP Bernie Mac & John Ritter - both were in top form in Bad Santa (as were all the other actors in it tbh)

The sequel is a fuckin shame

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10. DIE HARD
John McTiernan, USA, 2003
(388 points, 7 votes, 1 first-place vote)

METHINKS YOU POSTED THIS TO THE WRONG LIST SIR

Well, I'm glad we finally solved that.

Hans... BUBBE

lol I was a bit taken aback when “die hard is a Christmas movie lolol” and attendant backlash became a thing, because it just clearly and organically is, the same way a bunch of these are. I posted this the last time it came up I think but I watched half of it’s a wonderful life and there was like no Xmas content at all except a vague ripoff of ACC. The rules don’t even need to be very porous for die hard to count! I also really like it, one of my fave action movies

Ice Harvest is also better than Bad Santa