Merry Christmas Eve! Now is the perfect time to finalize your Christmas Day movie schedule. We highly encourage everyone to stay at home and follow the current CDC guidelines, but that doesn’t mean you can’t keep up with the classic Jewish tradition of watching movies and eating Chinese food on Christmas Day. Thanks to technology and streaming platforms it’s very easy to continue these traditions remotely. This week we have compiled together some of our favorite movies for you to watch.
Favorite Christmas Movies
While there may not be a lot of Chanukah movies, there sure is a plethora of Christmas movies to choose from. Here are 5 of our favorite Christmas movies in no particular order.
The Santa Clause Trilogy
We both love the Santa Clause trilogy. In this series, serious businessman Scott Calvin accidentally inherits the role of Santa Claus. The trilogy follows his misadventures as he adjusts to his new life – including finding Mrs. Claus and battling Jack Frost. Our favorite out of this series is The Santa Clause 2 which is full of lots of magic.
Jack Frost 1979
This is one of Marissa’s absolute favorites and she tries to watch it at least once every year. The classic claymation movies are her favorites. This movie tells the tale of Jack Frost who wants to become human. He makes a deal with Father Winter that if she can get a house, a horse, a bag of gold, and a wife by the first sign of spring, he will become a human permanently.
The Year Without a Santa Claus
This is another one of Marissa’s favorites. In this movie, Santa is sick and decides to take off Christmas. He doesn’t think the children of the world appreciate him anymore, so they won’t miss him if he doesn’t show up one year. But, two of his faithful elves and a baby reindeer travel to Southtown to prove him wrong.
The Holiday
Two women, on opposite sides of the world, find themselves alone around Christmas. Desperate to get away, they switch houses – Iris traveling from England to California, and Amanda traveling from California to England. While they took their trips to be alone at Christmas time, they find themselves falling in love with a couple of local men. This is one of Amanda’s favorite Christmas movies, and she believes that if you find it playing on TV, you are legally obligated to watch it.
How the Grinch Stole Christmas
This is another movie that we both love. It tells the classic story of the Grinch but adds some backstory and depth to the characters. We get to see exactly why the Grinch hates Christmas so much and his relationship with the whos down in Whoville. Also, Jim Carrey makes an amazing Grinch.
Favorite (Non-Christmas) Comfort Movies
Rudy
Ever since he was young Rudy, wanted to play for the Fighting Irish at Notre Dame. His family laughs at his ambitions and believe that he will just work at the steel mill like his brothers and father. While he does begin his adult life working at the steel mill, this movie follows his incredible journey of hard work and determination to play for his dream team. Amanda first watched this movie in her sixth-grade math class, and it’s warmed her heart ever since!
What a Girl Wants
This is the movie of a young woman named Daphne who has never met her father and has grown up feeling like something is missing. She takes a leap of faith and travels to England by herself to finally meet her dad. He comes from an old aristocratic family and is currently running for a seat in the House of Commons and is engaged to another woman. Coming from polar opposite upbringings, will Daphne fit in with her father’s lifestyle? We both absolutely adore this movie. This is not only one of Marissa’s favorite movies, but one of her favorite movie soundtracks. She remembers having the soundtrack played at her 7th birthday party.
The Lizzie McGuire Movie
We both love this movie too and we even watched it during one of our movie nights in college. It takes place after the series ended with the main characters graduating from middle school and getting ready for high school. Lizzie and Gordo go on a school trip to Italy over the summer with some familiar faces from the series. While there, they meet a famous Italian pop singer and discover Lizzie looks just like his former singing partner.
The Other Sister
This star-packed romantic comedy, directed by the great Garry Marshall, is sure to warm your heart. Juliette Lewis plays Carla Tate, a young woman with an intellectual disability, who does her best to show her mother how independent she can be. She meets Daniel, played by Giovanni Ribisi, at school and they instantly fall in love. This movie follows their love story and both their journeys to independence and is Amanda’s favorite movie of all time. If you give this movie a watch, be sure to watch out for what role Garry Marshall plays!
The Lion King
This is Marissa’s favorite movie and has been for many many years. It’s full of fun lovable characters, songs that will get stuck in your head, and a plot that will make you both laugh and cry. What more could you want?
Movies Being Released On (or Around) Christmas
The Prom (Netflix)
Set in Indiana, the head of the Edgewater High School PTA announces that the school’s prom is being canceled because a female student, Emma Nolan, wants to take her girlfriend to the dance (*gasp*). During this ordeal, over in NYC, several (not too nice) Broadway stars are disappointed when their new show closes on opening night. Needing a cause to seem caring and selfless, they drive to Indiana with two other musical theater performers after hearing Emma’s story to help save the prom and fight the prejudiced PTA leader. This is a movie adaptation of a 2018 Broadway musical of the same name, and is currently on Netflix!
Wonder Woman 1984 (HBOMax)
The first Wonder Woman movie took place in the 1940s during WWII as we see the origin story of Diana Prince becoming Wonder Woman. In this new film, we fast forward to the 1980s where Diana lives a low profile life curating ancient artifacts and only performs heroic acts as Wonder Woman. Now she must face new foes Max Lord and The Cheetah. This movie premieres on Christmas Day and is on HBO Max.
Soul (Disney+)
Jamie Foxx plays Joe Gardner, a middle school band teacher who gets an awesome chance to play at the best jazz club in town. With one small misstep, he ends up in The Great Before, where new souls get their interests, quirks and personalities before they go to Earth. Joe teams up with a soul named 22 to try and get back to his life and learns some lessons along the way. Catch this movie on Disney+ on December 25th!
Sylvie’s Love (Amazon Prime)
An old-Hollywood throwback with a predominantly black cast, this movie follows Sylvie who works in her dad’s record shop. One day at work she meets Robert, an aspiring jazz saxophonist, who manages to snag a job at her dad’s shop. Sparks fly in between shelving records and they fall in love. There’s only one catch: Sylvie is engaged to another man and Robert is leaving soon with his band for Paris. What will come of their romance? This film is set to release on December 23rd on Amazon Prime Video.
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (Netflix)
This Netflix original is based on the play of the same name, written by August Wilson in 1982. This play takes place over the course of an afternoon recording session in Chicago in the 1920s. Ma Rainey is the “Mother of Blues” and shows up late to her own recording session. She engages in a battle of wills with her white manager and producer over her music. While this is happening, trumpeter Levee is aspiring to make it big in the music industry and spurs the other musicians into an eruption of stories that will change their lives forever. This movie features some big names like Viola Davis and the late Chadwick Boseman. This is Boseman’s last film.
Now you have the movie. What about the Chinese food? While we can’t give you suggestions because we don’t know where you live, we can encourage you to shop local. Seek out a Chinese take out restaurant near you and have at it! Support a small business and get some delicious food. Speaking from experience, families who own small Chinese food restaurants are so grateful to have the business on Christmas.
No matter what you decide to do, we hope you can find the day relaxing amongst the crazy that has been 2020. Watch a movie, read a book, even clean! Do what makes you happy. It will take a while to get back to normal, but we are hopeful.
Until next week, wash your hands, wear a mask, and stay safe!
Love,
Amanda & Marissa
