Now that’s more like it. From the first frames of Santa Claus Is Coming to Town (fake newsreel footage of kids trying to get ready for the arrival of Santa Claus), I was sold. It’s filled with lush claymation landscapes, witty songs, a surprisingly complicated original plot, and themes that range from trying to be […]
The second of our classic animation trifecta is Frosty. Shorter and less revolutionary than its reindeer brethren, Frosty looks less like Coraline and more like a classic Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoon. A bunch of kids get together after school on the day before Christmas to make a snowman. A magician’s magic (and very argumentative) hat […]
Ah, claymation. The most sacred purview of Christmas movies. The next few installments of the 24 Days of Christmas will be going through the Christmas classics of the claymated and classically animated variety: Rudolph, Frosty, and Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town. First, to Rudolph. Narrated by Sam, the talking Snow Man, Rudolph starts with the […]
Another new Christmas movie for me! Although I’ve seen the animated version more times than you can shake a stick at*, and have read the book pretty consistently since childhood, I was full of enough Jim Carrey-fatigue by the time the live action version of Dr. Seuss’s How The Grinch Stole Christmas showed up that up […]
Before this project, I had never seen National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, a fact that inevitably elicited gasps from whomever I told it. It’s a classic, sure, but like most of the pre-Community Chevy Chase oeuvre, I somehow missed it. So it was with great joy that I undertook the task of partaking for the first […]
Stephen Spielberg! Christmas! Furry creatures that turn into murdering beasts! It’s a Rachael Christmassmorgasborg! Oh lord in Heaven, had I forgotten how much I love Gremlins. This 24 Days of movies project has been immensely rewarding, but nothing quite prepared me for the rewards of rewatching Gremlins as an adult. From the cheesy pseudo-noir opening […]
Christmas Carols are a dime a dozen. But versions, that don’t make me want to skip through half the ghosts? Well, those are much further and farther between. Mickey’s Christmas Carol is one of those, primarily because it’s only half an hour long. Also, apparently I just can’t handle the classic story if it’s not […]
I chose the black and white 1947 version of Miracle on 34th Street not because of some pretentious need to see the original, but because I don’t think I’ve ever seen it before. I know I’ve seen the Matilda version at some point in time, so I’m much more interested in seeing how the 1947 […]
It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia is probably the only thing less traditionally Christmas-y than Bad Santa. And yet the straight-to-DVD Always Sunny Christmas movie is about to become a new classic for my Christmas routine. Frank Reynolds (Danny DeVito) was a horrible father to Deandra (Kaitlin Olson) and Dennis (Glenn Howerton) throughout a childhood of […]
I went through a brief period in high school when I was positively obsessed with Jimmy Stewart. It was when I first started to get into older films, and I devoured Harvey, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, The Philadelphia Story, Destry Rides Again and a bunch of other movies that starred Stewart. I didn’t watch […]
In honor of Home Alone, a movie I must have watched fifty four thousand times from age 3 to age 13, and not a single time since, I’m going to do this whole review in the form of random observations, and let my rampant, 24-year-old ID take the reins: • Holy Shit, Macauley is young. […]
From the first moment of Bad Santa, the film is fully defining its viewpoint. Billy Bob Thorton, looking alcoholic skinny with a cigarette in his hand and a Santa suit hanging angrily off his lanky frame, provides voice over narration to a scene that is set at a bar and which ends with Billy Bob […]
When I say to people that I love all Christmas movies, the good, the bad, and the really bad, I think that I mean it. That doesn’t mean they’re all equally entertaining or anything, but I can sit through pretty much anything if you put a Santa hat on it. I decided to test that […]
Half the battle with watching The Santa Clause is just ignoring the late 90s parade of former stars (Judge Reinhold!) and future stars (David Krumholtz) and stars that inexplicably have stuck around long after their usefulness (Tim Allen, although he actually gets a lifetime pass for Toy Story) that litter the pathways. Add to that […]
I love Christmas movies. Actually, scratch that, I love everything about Christmas to an extent that is probably unhealthy. Growing up as a little half jewish, half not-ish girl, the month of December was probably my favorite time of year (except maybe for my birth month, but the fact that I insisted on a whole […]
Despite my unabiding love for all things Christmas related, I mostly thought this week’s Glee was inconsistent and goofy (although I can never have enough Grinch parodies in my life). However, how freaking fantastic was that Baby It’s Cold Outside number between Kurt and Blaine? I’m madly in love with Darren Criss (and have been […]