Looking forward to curling up around the TV with loved ones
to enjoy any one of the countless holiday classics? Having trouble deciding
what to watch first? Well be of good cheer and keep the faith. Your ol’ pal Bob
has come through. I’ll navigate you through that holiday section of the video
store, avoiding the land mines and finishing with a bag of picks full of
favorite flicks.
Before we get to the reviews themselves, I realize that the
suspense here is just about killing you, so let’s cut right to the bone. First,
my Top Ten List. Then, my explanations. Some of these will not surprise you at
all. Others on the list are debatable indeed. Many will take issue with me.
Just remember to be kind. It is the holiday season after all.
Bob’s Highly Recommended Top 10 Holiday Videos
1) It’s A Wonderful Life
2) Miracle on 34th
Street
3) Scrooge (Musical Version)
4) A Charlie Brown Christmas
5) How The Grinch Stole Christmas
6) A Christmas Story
7) The Santa Clause
8) The Santa Clause 2
9) Jingle All the Way
10) Home Alone
Obvious Question One: Why did I not pick the favorite
classic of many, White Christmas?
Although I can objectively admit that this was a well-made,
spectacular production with a talented cast, personally I just didn’t like it
very much. How’s that for blatant honesty? A good musical to be sure, White
Christmas simply doesn’t do anything for me over the holidays. Besides, the
song, White Christmas
is one of my least favorite Christmas carols. Not
that it’s a bad song. The melody is actually quite nice and Bing Crosby
sang
this Irving Berlin composition as well as anyone possibly could. Still,
the
tune is overdone and plays on the radio far too frequently, often with
jazzed
up versions that mess with the tempo and change the melody line,
massacring the piece altogether. This makes my Christmas a little
less merry. True, dead pan versions of the song are not the fault
of the movie itself. But what can I say?
A bad taste has been left in my mouth.
Sometimes a film can be good but not our own cup of tea. If you love White Christmas, please
realize that no harm is really being done here. After all, White Christmas
is on everyone else’s movie list. But for me to place a film on my own sacred scroll, I must be
able to actually enjoy the thing whether it was good or not.
Obvious Question Two: Do you have any favorites that did not
make your top ten list?
Yes, Disney’s Babes in
Toyland. It was delightful, brilliant, horrible and stupid, all at the same
time. This means it’s good enough for me to personally enjoy but terrible enough
to quarantine it from my Top Ten List. I’ll explain the good and the bad with Babes in Toyland when I get into the
movie reviews themselves.
Obvious Question Three: Do you have a list of the worst
Christmas movies?
Oh yes! Thank you for
asking! Can you sense that I am salivating right now? However (and this is
really important) although many awful holiday movies have been released, the
few I personally hate are so bad, they deserve to be highlighted in isolation.
Therefore, this will not be much of a list.
The absolute worst Christmas movie ever made was The
Grinch. I refer to Ron Howard’s remake of the Dr. Seuss animated classic.
You will notice that the original version made my Top Ten List. This means I
feel as much admiration for the television classic as I feel contempt for the
remake.
The other worst (and many will disagree with me) is Elf.
OK. I let the cat out of the bag. Now you know the favorites
and the least favorites of your ol’ pal Bob (as if this has been keeping you up
at nights).
For explanations as to why I made these choices, see Volume
Two.
P.S. As I type right now on my laptop, the coffee shop is
playing Christmas music. I am listening to Barbara Streisand’s
version of Jingle Bells
and it is
reminding me of something painful: Although I do not have a Top Ten
List of Worst Christmas Songs, this one would be absolutely, positively
on the very highest pinnacle. Indeed, it could not possibly be higher.
I actually like Babs as a
singer and I even own a few of her CDs. But her version of Jingle Bells? Oh…Let’s see….How about if I just mercifully drop the
subject?