As my wife and I started our Christmas movie season watching White Christmas the other night, I smiled thinking how “It’s the most wonderful time of the year” as Andy Williams liked to sing. White Christmas is one of our favorites to watch and I could easily have titled this article “My Top Five Christmas Movies” until I realized there’s “something missing” in all five and seems common to almost all Christmas movies.
The five movies I’ve chosen to write about we’ve watched every Christmas for years though White Christmasonly made it to the list in the past ten years. I’ll do my best to avoid spoilers for those of you who haven’t seen the five, even though I think the group of people who haven’t seen them is very small. When I started writing this, I was surprised at how many Christmas movies there are but couldn’t find anything where an actual number was indicated. This might be possibly because what defines a Christmas movie varies. For instance, a few days ago someone told me they watch Bruce Willis’s Diehard every Christmas. Surprised, I asked why. Looking somewhat perplexed, they answered, “Because it’s a Christmas movie.”
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