Christmas is a complicated time. I have difficulty feeling childhood nostalgia too deeply, because it's thickly coated in so many varicose veins, that my brain gets saggy and old. So the day itself, that nearly every person alive has the most feelings about, I neglect the most. At least for most of my past. They didn't really start to become great and memorable until I met Paul. And a lot of that goodness came from making me revisit old holiday movie favorites, exposing me to ones that I wished I had always known, and then the endless list that we viewed together for the first time. Movies with an underlining message of Noel immediately takes me to that warm and fuzzy annual morning of waking up at dawn with my favorite person. Now it's people. These feelings are good and make me think more about the art itself, and how it can profoundly reach something inside of you that may be laying dormant. These are several instances in this specific genre that always do the trick for me.
- Babes
10. Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
For some reason, Daniel Stern getting electrocuted until he turns into a skeleton, made me laugh so hard when I was a kid, that I peed my pants for the first time ever. I never even did this as a potty training toddler. As an adult, I am aware of the foolishness of the feature, and the ridiculousness that this scene presents, but goddammit if I don't snicker, and share this anecdote with my husband every single year.
9. Prancer
I'm not made of stone. And not everything can be blamed on female hormones. But when that little girl tries to save Santa's reindeer out of extreme personal loss and kinship for the animal, I weep like a baby without a mama. And in this great world founded on love of Claus, his reindeer would spoon a wounded child, to keep her warm from dying of hypothermia. Santa is real, and sends us messages of hope, but only when we really need it the most. After all, we're all doing a lot better than we think we are, and don't really need his gifts at all.
8. Bad Santa
When I saw this in the theater, I was the only person laughing from beginning to end. And I didn't hide it. I was a regular Max Cady. It was a perfectly harmonious cartoon duo, featuring the over the top demoralized bum, and his super sweet and mentally challenged sidekick. And their first scene together is one of the greatest comedy scenes in cinema.
7. Scrooged
As an ultra precocious child, I was always aware of any supernatural elements in cinema. And I found it all very fascinating. Bill Murray beginning to experience his gift from Jacob Marley, is one of the more trippy scenes I had seen. Realities begin to slowly bleed together, causing visual disturbances, that only he can see. As a small child it made me wonder if this was what other dimensions may be like. I still look fondly at the upsetting closeup of John Glover's mouth and think that it may have contributed to my surrealistic approach to art.
6. A Christmas Story
I never saw this growing up like all of you. It somehow had evaded me my entire life. But I'm glad I'm on the ball now. And I won't ever tire from it the way most of you will. Everyone takes from it what they will. For me? I get hungry. And any year on Christmas Day, whether it's for the worst reason in the world or not, that we get to eat Chinese food, I'm a happy girl.
5. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation
Fuck Charlie Brown's tiny-ass Christmas shrub. If you're going to go out of your way to bring a goddamn tree into your house, likely for the entirety of a month, then go big or go fuck off. I sympathize with Clark. This should be a tradition followed, and it very damn well should involve your children. Do it yourself. Make it a magical experience. Just parent the shit out of their dressing habits that day, and try not to let their bodies become frozen fish sticks.
4. Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer
This has been burned into my skull since I've been alive and I am certain I've done the same for my own child. It just feels like Christmas Eve. Makes you wish the day was here. And now when the elves sing "We are Santa's Elves," I will forever think of my sweet little boy parading it to me with his arms full of the plush stuffed animals. This is family.
3. The Snowman
I saw this long ago by happenstance, but I'm forever grateful that I did. It shares with you the magic of Santa, and enchants you with its music. You're left in awe, and need a full year to process until the next Christmas, before you can feel again their great journey through the sky.
2. Eyes Wide Shut
Unless you're a completely vapid person, with no inner feelings, cares, or worries, there is the likelihood that you are experiencing a tremendous amount of things right now in addition to your holiday spirit. Stanley, Nicole, and Tom take you out of the Hallmark holiday dream, and throw you into the nightmare of stripping away the layers. And while the perversions at the mansion may seem farfetched, it's that little bit of possibility that makes you wish that all holiday parties were like that.
1. It's a Wonderful Life
You may have a plan for your life, but chaos has other things for you. You can make some choices, which can create lines, but the meteors of existence, turn that more into a squiggle. You can either:
Choose to be pissed about it, live your life in misery, and make things hard for other people.
Be complacent - think only of your next meal, and when the last time you had a bowel movement was.
Or you can accept things just the way they are. Be happy with the imperfectly balanced and subtle differences that the universe threw at you. George Bailey knows the right answer. The secret to all life. And belting it out at the end is a message for all of you too. Perk up your damn ears.
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