Jon Galiotto
Raised Rowdy Contributor and Professional List Maker
‘Tis the season to eat too much, not exercise as much as you should and spend quality time fighting over which Christmas movie you’re going to watch next. Here are my Top 5 Christmas movies to watch every year.
Top 5 Christmas Movies:
- Elf: This is probably one of the greatest movies ever made. What Christmas movie is complete without an epic snowball battle, the worlds best cup of coffee, discovering your long lost father is on the naughty list, finding love and learning elves diet consists of candy, candy canes, candy corn, and syrup. I’m still trying to retrace Buddy’s steps back to the North Pole but have yet to find the 7 levels of the candy cane forest or the swirly-twirly gumdrops anywhere near the Lincoln Tunnel. I both respect and hate Will Ferrell for not making a sequel. While the rational side of me knows that a sequel will never live up to the original and would probably suck, the much larger irrational side says damn you for not trying.
- National Lampoons Christmas Vacation: This is a classic and debatably the best National Lampoon movie ever made. Every time I hear Trace Adkins “Every Light in the House”, I think about Clark hanging lights and the front lawn looking like runway lights. Who can’t relate to Clark wanting a perfect Christmas but your crazy family does everything to ruin it. We all have that Aunt or Uncle that brings a gross side dish, says the pledge as dinner prayer or boxes up the family cat as a gift. Who hasn’t had that crazy, redneck cousin park his RV outside your house for days on end and is willing to kidnap your boss at the drop of a dime for you? Please tell me I’m not the only one who believes this movie just changed my family members names to protect their identity!
- Die Hard: I know it’s highly contested as to whether Die Hard is a Christmas movie or not so I will clear it up for you…IT IS! John McClain aka Bruce ‘the Juice’ Willis travels to see his family and then has to kick ass and save Christmas and basically the world from terrorists on Christmas Eve. If that’s not enough, he performs a Christmas miracle and makes it SNOW in LA for Christmas! It doesn’t get anymore Christmasier then that.
- Home Alone: The original movie is another classic everyone seems to end up watching at least once a year and finds something you missed or forgot about. I recently saw a meme ‘Harry and Marv’ (AKA the bad guys) saying they were spotted in the neighborhood. If you’re still meme-worthy 28 years after airing, you deserve to be in the top 5. Kevin’s creative ways of thwarting burglars are not only entertaining but gave countless Rowdy Kids new ways to injure themselves or siblings. The sequels (pretty sure there’s over 100 now) never lived up to the original for me but they managed to keep Macaulay from ever having to work again.
- Christmas Story: It never feels like Christmas until you are flipping through the stations and you come across this movie playing 24/7. It’s one of those movies that you can start watching at any point, whether it started 5 minutes ago or there’s 5 minutes left. Who can’t relate to dad trying to put up some sort of inappropriate decoration in the house and justifying it to mom that it’s a major award or some other BS reason that mom hates. I guarantee some of you Rowdies bet a friend to do something dumb, like stick your tongue to a frozen pole or got your mouth washed out with soap for swearing in front of an adult. Everyone remembers going to see Santa and forgetting what’s on your list because he smells like old cheese and booze. Finally, who didn’t mail order a mystery decoder ring and the anticipation while waiting for the radio…ok maybe this part is a little dated. Any way you spin it, this movie is a classic and will be watched by generations to come.
A couple honorable mentions go out to Bad Santa, Scrooged, and The Grinch. Let us know your Top 5!
PS – If anyone actually ever shot their eye out with a BB gun please let me know cause I’m with Ralphie and calling BS.