Holiday films and specials are a favorite American pastime. Whether you watch the same cherished movie with your family every year or you’re running out to the theatre Christmas morning to see that potential Oscar contender on its premiere date, holiday specials never fail to work their way into our lives as a beloved tradition.

However creating a Christmas classic certainly requires a magical mixture of ingredients.  A few cups of sentiment, a drop of imaginary wonder, spoonfuls of yuletide joy and unforgettable quotes that make it a definitive holiday trademark.

15. “Elf” - “Buddy the elf, what’s your favorite color?” Will Ferrell stars as Buddy, who thinks he is one of Santa’s little helpers, but is clearly out of place. One of the most hilarious Christmas stories ever written and Ferrell at his finest.

14. “A Christmas Carol” (Original B&W Version) - The 1951 British classic stars Alastair Sim as Scrooge and has its share of darkness and happiness as old Ebenezer is haunted by three spirits on Christmas Eve. The funniest moment is when Scrooge’s housekeeper Mrs. Dilber awakes him on Christmas morning and he raises her pay from 2 shillings a week to 10, she responds almost half frightened, “Merry Christmas Mr. Scrooge. In keeping with the situation!” (more…)

As a child I always looked forward to that annual rite of the holiday season: the prime time broadcast of animated Christmas specials. I’m not sure why these meant so much to me–some of them were downright bizarre.

Now that my four-year-old daughter has been asking to watch some of them, I began thinking about the actual content. Here’s a run down of my impressions of a few of the TV specials. (If I get some of the details wrong, excuse me, but I’m not going to go back and re-view every one. My memory should be good enough, having watched all of them annually for more than ten years.)

A Charlie Brown Christmas

I did watch this one recently–I picked up a DVD and settled in with my daughter and a bucket of popcorn. I was surprised at a couple of things. For one, its only 30 minutes long. I remember it as a feature length film. I guess it seemed more of an epic tale when I was a kid. Also surprising, there are several threats of physical violence in the show. Not that I mind a little fighting in children’s programming–it just came as a surprise that the Peanuts gang seemed to resolve many of their conflicts by simply punching each other in the face. When my daughter asked about it I just said, “I think these kids are from California.”  I know it made no sense, but it put an end to the conversation.

What did not surprise me about the Charlie Brown special was the now de rigueur message about the over-commercialization of Christmas. I guess this was a quaint theme in 1970 but I think we’ve heard enough of it by now. Can we all just admit that commercialization puts food on everyone’s table and is basically the engine that drives everything that is good, convenient, tasty, and comfortable about our lives? (more…)

There’s been a dearth of Yuletide material here at Big Hollywood this month, so as The Most Wonderful Day of the Year draws nigh, let’s spend some time saluting the five men whose voices echo most strongly through the Christmas chapters of the Great American songbook.

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5. Johnny Mathis (b. 1935)

A host of other crooners fought tooth and nail for this fifth slot — Dean Martin, Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Andy Williams, Jim Reeves, Gene Autry, Nat King Cole — but Mathis wins the day via an impressive five Christmas-themed albums, the best of which are immeasurably improved by the melodic mastery of maestro Percy Faith (1908-1976), whose inventive yet unashamedly unambiguous orchestrations make him my favorite instrumental interpreter of Christmas tunes.

The only one of our Top 5 who is still alive, Mathis made his Xmas bones by singing what is, for my money, the single most beautiful rendition of “Ave Maria” ever recorded — a feat accomplished when he was just twenty-two. Fifty years on, no one has matched the infectious, jingling energy Mathis and Faith brought to “Sleigh Ride.” And despite a good showing by Andy Williams, I daresay he takes the prize for “It’s The Most Wonderful Time of the Year” and “Winter Wonderland” as well. (more…)

Inevitably, as the Top 25 Greatest Christmas Movie list rolls on, some start to wonder when specials like “A Charlie Brown Christmas” will get their due. Well, they won’t on a list exclusive to feature films, but they will here.

You know, I never thought I’d be old enough to use the phrase “kids today,” but here goes… With DVD and DVR and all this other digital snap-your-fingers instant gratification, kids today might think they have it better than those of us of a certain age – and okay, maybe they do – but back in the days before America figured out disco and Jimmy Carter sucked, there was something to be said for the pure pleasure of anticipation I had as a child with the Sunday morning arrival of the Milwaukee Journal.

Screw the comics, I’d grab the TV section, squirrel away somewhere with a red pen, pour through it as though it were the Dead Sea Scrolls, and circle everything that needed to be watched that week.  

Yes, kids, this is the way it once was. Believe it or not, there was an era before Internet, DVD, VHS, HBO or DVR when there was only UHF and VHF – 4 networks and one independent station that required a rabbit ear antennae with enough aluminum foil wrapped around it to work as a heat shield for the space shuttle. (more…)

Looking back at The Karate Kid (1984), which turned twenty-five years old this week, a thought keeps recurring.

Wow. . . Avildsen made it work twice.

John G. Avildsen is, in some ways, a director of little distinction when compared with well-known marquee names like Spielberg, Scorsese, Nolan, and Tarantino. The vast majority of his movies are utterly forgotten by the average filmgoer — indeed, he’s been nominated for Worst Director at The Razzies three times. And yet, like Victor Fleming decades earlier with his twin successes The Wizard of Oz and Gone with the Wind (both 1939 — read a great recent article on Fleming here), Avildsen has twice punched way above his weight, netting himself an Oscar for Best Director and giving birth to some of the most memorable moments in motion picture history. (more…)