Holiday Movie Countdown and a #giveaway

Hi readers! Thanks for all your lists of favorite holiday movies. A winner for the giveaway has been selected and notified.

by Barb, just returned from a holiday party. Santa was there!

Hi All. Christmas is my favorite season. I love the anticipation, the family traditions, the decorations pulled out year after year.

One of my traditions is rewatching holiday movies. A familiar, well-loved story is the perfect background to making cookies, decorating, addressing cards, and wrapping presents.

Everyone’s holiday movie list is different, but sometime this month, I will watch the following. (Some of the clips will have ads, but you can skip them after five seconds.)

10. Planes, Trains and Automobiles

Ha! Not a Christmas movie, but a Thanksgiving one. But that’s what makes it such a great way to kick of your holiday viewing season.

9. Home Alone

I just watched the Netflix moving about the making of Home Alone (The Movies that Made Us) and that made this movie somehow even more enjoyable.

8. The Family Man

There are hundreds of Scrooge variants–and why shouldn’t there be? It’s an amazing story. One of my favorites is this one with Nicholas Cage and Tea Leoni.

7. The Family Stone

This is a flawed and occasionally annoying movie, but it has flashes of insight and killer moments that still lead me to watch it almost every year.

6. George C. Scott’s Christmas Carol

I love the Christmas Carol descendants and variants (see above), but my favorite straight-up version is the one starring George C. Scott.

5. White Christmas

This is one of the goofiest movies ever made. It only works if you don’t wonder too hard why a former general would build a 1000 seat theater and a full sound stage in rural Vermont. In fact, it only works if you don’t wonder about a lot of things. But I love it. I also love and read every year Tom and Lorenzo’s hilarious critique.

4. The Holiday

I kicked off the season with this one this year, watching it on Cape Cod with my daughter, niece and sister-in-law. It’s a great story filled with really cool houses and it’s very heartwarming if you don’t think about the future of the two central couples too hard.

3. About a Boy

This one is a bit of a cheat, since it’s not really a Christmas movie. But it does have two Christmas scenes and a New Year’s Eve party, so I’m including it here. It’s one of my favorite movies for any season, and it would be higher on this list if it was actually a Christmas movie.

2. It’s a Wonderful Life

I love this movie. I love Jimmy Stewart. I love the message. And I love that every time I see it I spot some little detail I never noticed before.

1. Love Actually

This for me is the ne plus ultra of Christmas movies. The one I have to watch every year. I love everything about it and the ending montage gets me every time.

I had to leave a bunch off and I also might reorder the list if I did it again tomorrow, but here are my ten and I’m sticking to it. (For now.)

Readers: How about you? Leave a comment with your favorite holiday movie and be entered to win the two holiday novella collections.