The War on Christmas (Movies)
There’s nothing more controversial this time of year with movies than Die Hard. By most film study standards, it’s a classic and a staple of structure, but when people gather in this post-Thanksgiving-pre-New Year time frame, it becomes the war to ruin the evening.
The defense says it’s set in a Christmas party scene and has Christmas motifs and music.
The prosecution claims it violates the spirit of Christmas and doesn’t carry the theme of Christmas at all.
That might be summarizing the arguments, but I think it does the job. This gets at the larger argument that Die Hard encompasses and many, many, more movies fall under: What the candy-cane is the definition of a Christmas movie and what in Santa’s Eggnog are those other things?
Maybe the purists need to loosen their stockings and embrace the inclusivity that makes up the holiday cheer. Or maybe the heathens need to check their list and see why Frosty and John McClane aren’t on the same list. Some folks think that the real solution all along is to say that it’s what’s in your heart that makes a movie a Christmas movie (blame the Star Wars faire and Joel Schumacher’s Phantom of the Opera for that one.) I think that is a lump of coal.
At this point, I’d like to assure one and all that this won’t end the War of Christmas. The military industrial tinsel complex is far too strong to allow for peace and good will toward all men, and women. What I hope to provide is a respectful compromise.
What if we consider a pseudo category of December themed holiday films? For the more explosive oriented fans out there, you must admit that violence is a bit off from the message of peace and all that stuff Christmas represents, unless it’s in defense of Santa’s workshop from a siege. On the flip side, the themes and messages in a number of those action films are on point, from a family being reunited to forgiveness to an overabundance of snowmen and Christmas trees, even if they include bats.
Granted half of these pseudo classed films are directed by Shane Black and Tim Burton, there is a reason for it. Certain holiday, or holidays, that exist in this time of year bring people together. Summarizing Shane Black’s reasoning, it’s a grounded and unifying event that allows different things to happen and unlike other holidays that may serve similar purposes, provides a yearly metric of life.
So that said, Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa are important. It makes sense that stories outside of peace love and visits from non-ethereal spirits might be told around these days. Limiting Christmas movies to only stories of the mushy theme really should make every hallmark channel movie a “Christmas Movie”.
For the most part Home Alone is accepted as a clear Christmas movie. Extremists can claim it takes place across a longer period of time and isn’t really about Christmas as The Mary Sue points out, but I can’t imagine any of those purists would read this far so I’m not going to worry about them. On the other side, there’s the classic horror flick Krampus that takes place on Christmas and is about the meaning of Christmas, but I can easily see dashed from traditionalists’ lists because it’s horror to the extreme.
Without this getting too long, I’ll try to wrap this up. There’s grey space and those can be legit Christmas movies too, maybe not the pure Christmas movies, and maybe not even Christmas (I’m looking at you 8 Crazy Nights) but they can still count and celebrate the feelings of this chaotic, cold, and cozy season.
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