It’s the hap-happiest season of all. We bring nature inside as we adorn our living spaces with seasonally appropriate trees, and we light up the longer nights with bright and colourful lights. Music from generations long since passed is re-played and re-contextualised, and centuries old iconography is re-evaluated and repurposed.

There’ll be parties for hosting, marshmallows for toasting, and carolling out in the snow. If we’ve been good, we’ll receive gifts (thanks Santa!), and if we’re lucky we’ll eat so much food we can barely move. Almost certainly, we’ll watch a movie. From the Netflix Originals of the current era to the silver screen classics of wartime Hollywood, Christmastime movie watching doesn’t discriminate based on picture quality, colour or the lack thereof, acting powerhouses or barely trained actors – if it works, it works. And if it’s good, we’ll hold onto it forever.

In this Movie List from The Film Magazine, we’ve scoured the annals of Christmas movie history to bring you the very best of the best to watch this holiday season. These films are Christmas classics and beloved cult hits, some culturally significant and others often overlooked. These films are seasonal treats; two advent calendars worth of movie magic from the big-wigs in Hollywood and beyond.

Short films (those with a runtime of under one hour) will not be included here, nor will films that cross multiple seasons but feel like Christmas movies – sorry You’ve Got Mail and Bridget Jones’s Diary. Debatable Christmas movies like Gremlins have also been omitted because of their inclusion in our alternative list “10 Excellent Non-Christmas Films Set at Christmas“. Seasonal classic The Apartment has also been disqualified on the grounds that it covers Christmas and beyond, and is arguably more of a new year’s movie.

These are 50 Unmissable Christmas Movies as chosen by The Film Magazine team members. Entries by Mark Carnochan, Kieran Judge, Martha Lane, Sam Sewell-Peterson and Joseph Wade.

Follow @thefilmagazine on X (Twitter).

1. Remember the Night (1940)

Golden Era stars Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray (who would go on to star in The Apartment) spark an unlikely romance when Stanwyck’s Lee Leander steals a bracelet from a jewellery store and MacMurray’s John “Jack” Sargent is assigned to prosecute her over the Christmas holidays.

One of the era’s many beloved studio romantic comedies, Remember the Night features all the elements that would come to define the genre while encompassing some screwball comedy and classic transatlantic accents. The tagline read “When good boy meets bad girl they remember the night”, and it’s likely you’ll remember this seasonal treat too. JW

2. The Shop Around the Corner (1940)

Few things signal classic Hollywood Christmases like Jimmy Stewart, and 6 years before arguably his most memorable performance in the iconic Frank Capra Christmas movie It’s a Wonderful Life, he starred in a seasonal favourite that was just as beloved by critics, The Shop Around the Corner.

This holiday romance from Ernst Lubitsch (who also directed Heaven Can Wait) sees Stewart’s Alfred fall in love with his pen pal who, unbeknownst to him, is the colleague he most despises at his gift store job – You’ve Got Mail has got nothing on this. With some hearty moments and all of the circumstantial comedy of the best movies of the era, The Shop Around the Corner will make you laugh and fill your heart in that special way that only the best Christmas movies can. JW

3. Holiday Inn (1942)

Early sound pictures were revolutionised by famed tap dancer Fred Astaire, and by 1942 he was a certified movie musical megastar. In Mark Sandrich’s seasonal musical Holiday Inn, he teams with would-be Christmas icon and man with a voice as sooth as silk, Bing Crosby. The result is one of the most iconic and influential Christmas movies ever made.

The film’s outdated attitude towards race are cringe-inducing and inexcusable in a 21st century context (there’s a whole sequence featuring blackface), but its other dated sensibilities shine bright amongst more modern and commercial Christmas films; its wholesome aura, classic dance scenes, and era-defining songs making for an unmissable experience. To top it all, Bing Crosby sings “White Christmas” for the first time in this film, cementing it in history as a seasonal classic. JW

4. Meet Me in St. Louis (1944)

Widely acknowledged as one of the holiday season’s best-ever films, Vincente Minnelli (An American in Paris) illuminates his would-be wife Judy Garland in arguably her most established performance, bringing Christmas cheer to all without sacrificing any of the harsh realities facing the American people in the first half of the 20th century.

Featuring the original (and arguably the best) rendition of Christmas classic “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”, and being anchored by some heartbreaking story elements, Meet Me In St. Louis maintains its power and relevance 80 years on. It offers a Christmas movie that will forever mark the height of its sub-genre, as well as the two filmmaking careers (of Minnelli and Garland) that helped to define the era. JW

Recommended for you: There’s No Place Like St. Louis at Christmas

5. Christmas in Connecticut (1945)

Remember the Night star Barbara Stanwyck is once again front and centre for a Golden Era Hollywood Christmas movie, this time playing a city magazine editor whose lies about being a perfect housewife are put to the test when her boss and a returning war hero invite themselves to her house.

This is screwball comedy with all the spirit of the festive season is as romantic as it is funny, and prominently features the shadows of World War II to gift the film a unique emotionality that has ensured it is rewatched year on year. JW

Normally, So Bad it’s Good features films that are unintentionally funny; bad acting, ridiculous plots and poor production often contribute to accidental humour and create instant classics. Jingle All the Way is actually intended as a comedy, so if you laugh and enjoy the film, it’s easy to believe the film is doing it’s job. When you watch too many films, like myself, it becomes relatively easy  to spot when a film is actually trying to be funny and when it’s not. Jingle All the Way is one such film – Arnold Schwarzenegger is no comedian and with Jake Lloyd being the centre of all Star Wars fan’s hatred, only an amazing script with comedy geniuses behind the humour could make this film genuinely funny.

At the centre of Jingle All the Way is the Langston family: Howard Langston (Schwarzenegger) is growing ever distant with his family, his frequent work gets in the way of his family life, missing his son Jamie’s (Lloyd) achievements and threatening his marriage with his wife. After missing Jamie’s latest karate achievement, Howard promises to get his son whatever he wants for Christmas, giving him one last chance to redeem himself. Jamie wants nothing more than a Turbo Man action-figure for Christmas, it’s the hottest toy of the year and it will ultimately restore Jamie’s faith in his father. Howard thinks he’s saved Christmas for his family, until he realises… he hasn’t actually bought the toy for Jamie – we’ll just assume he expected his wife to have bought it, or that he simply forgot about it. Howard must now spend Christmas Eve finding somewhere that hasn’t sold out of the toy and then make it home in time to take his family to the annual Christmas parade. Along his journey he meets Myron Larabee (Sinbad) who is also hunting down the same toy for his son, but, as tensions rise, the competition between the two turns ugly.

Jingle All the Way is a fun Christmas film, it was a great Christmas movie to watch as a kid with its warm and feel-good vibe. A lot of the film is relatable to you as child with its materialistic ideology, the whole idea that all a child cares about for christmas is a plastic toy seemed so normal. As an adult it comes across as over the top and ridiculous, and in that sense you could really look upon Jingle All the Way as a shallow film that promotes values you really wouldn’t want to teach children. A common but unfair assumption, as the film doesn’t take itself too seriously; it’s intentionally over the top as it was intended to parody the Christmas rush for the Cabbage Patch dolls in the 1980s. While the film initially makes the Turbo Man doll the centre of Jamie’s lust for Christmas, his materialistic values eventually fizzle out and the film’s true meaning emerges. The Turbo Man is simply the cover story for Jamie’s frustration with his father for not showing love and interest in his family and not keeping promises. While the film may occasionally take itself seriously, Levant makes it clear that the film’s true intention not to promote materialism, but to mock it and show just how ridiculous it is. The film’s true agenda was to show that opening presents and enjoying the material side of Christmas means absolutely nothing to children if they don’t have a loving family to enjoy it with.

With that being said you might be thinking that the film really doesn’t sound too bad… but, aside from having a positive ideology, the only aspect that really makes Jingle All the Way watchable is just the fact that it’s Arnold Schwarzenegger trying to be funny. Schwarzenegger is naturally funny for all of the wrong reasons – it’s a different kind of humour watching him trying to be genuinely funny – but, as a whole, Jingle All the Way almost entirely fails to be funny. There are, of course, a few genuinely funny segments. A personal favourite of mine is between Howard and a police chief, where Howard is always in the wrong place at the wrong time and causes a different injury to the officer each time they encounter one another. The character who steals the show in terms of comedy however is Ted Maltin (Phil Hartman). Hartman plays the typical, ever-present, slimy neighbour who has everything the protagonist doesn’t. Hartman perfectly executes smug and arrogance in every aspect of his character, from how he speaks to even how he stands. Hartman plays the role so over the top, but it’s a type of character than cannot be pulled off unless it’s being done this way. We’ve all known someone like Ted: the smug, competitive ‘friend’ who has everything given to them. To see that type of character represented so perfectly actually makes Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character somewhat relatable, which is unheard of to say the least.

The rest of Jingle All the Way isn’t funny. The inclusion of Sinbad always baffled me; I didn’t find him funny as a kid and as an adult I find him not only unfunny, but painful to watch, as every attempt at humour just fails at even being remotely comical. The simple appeal of Jingle All the Way is Arnold Schwarzenegger and the fact that it’s a perfectly cheesy Christmas film for those who enjoy Christmas. It makes a mockery of materialism and promotes the right Christmas message, so while it’s not a completely awful film, it’s still bad enough to be enjoyed with a particular sense of humour.

14/24