What are your film- and/or TV-related festive traditions?
Me, I like to watch A Charlie Brown Christmas — which appears to be available to stream only on Apple TV+ globally — while wrapping presents… or at least I’ll listen to the soundtrack, which is in heavy rotation in my ears over the holidays.
You?
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Always: A CHRISTMAS CAROL (Alistair Sim). Often: the shoot-your-eye-out kid. Sometimes: ELF.
Always: A CHRISTMAS CAROL (Alistair Sim).
Me, also. And Miracle on 34th Street, both in the original, un-colorized versions. Which I bought because the TV stations that ran them kept cutting more and more from them, each time.
I believe Apple makes A Charlie Brown Christmas free to stream around Christmas, fwiw.
For me, my must-watches every year are The Muppet Christmas Carol, Emmet Otter’s Jug Band Christmas, The (original, animated) Grinch, and I always watch Charlie Brown on Christmas Eve.
I usually also get in a viewing of Elf and Christmas Vacation. And last year I watched Klaus for the first time, and I definitely want to watch that again this year!
My usual tradition is to go to a theatre with the largest screen I can find and see a brand-new movie that needs to be watched on a big screen. This year, for medical and religious reasons, I couldn’t do that.
The French Dispatch should not be watched on a tiny iPhone. It’s obvious from the first shot of the first scene. But the movie really is that good. I think I have to admit, for better or worse, that Wes Anderson is now my favorite director. And when I watch the film again, it will feel new, because I’ll be able to see the details I missed the first time. I may notice even more the third and fourth times around.
Also, I think that if they played the lullaby scene, at its full length, as a trailer, every screening would sell out.
Here’s an excerpt (if it stays online). It’s a little spoilery, but not enough, in my opinion, to stop them from using it as a trailer.
https://youtu.be/Ylh2Oz0D-4M
A Charlie Brown Christmas is also my favorite special to rewatch (and what I’ll vocally vote for when visiting my dad’s family, in hopes of forestalling another viewing of Elf or The Santa Clause).
My own tradition is Christmas Eve ghost stories of all kinds, particularly that series produced I believe by the BBC. This year we rewatched The Tractate Middoth.