30 Best Christmas Movies of All Time — A Yuletide Playlist

Top Christmas Movies 

30. Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (2010)

What if Santa wasn’t a benevolent toy delivery man but instead a monster trapped in ice? That’s the plot of Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale – a 2010 movie from Finnish filmmaker Jalmari Helander.

Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale may not have as wide of an audience as many of the other movies on this list, but it’s certainly carved out a niche for itself in the Christmas movies genre. It's such a unique entry in the genre that Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale should be on every list of Christmas movies worth watching.

Classic Christmas Movies

29. Bad Santa (2003)

Bad Santa takes Christmas movie genre tropes and flips them on their head with a deconstructionist plot and raunchy characters. Billy Bob Thornton stars in the film as the titular “bad Santa,” Willie, who is more interested in drinking himself to death than he is with saving Christmas. Bad Santa wasn’t a revolutionary Christmas movie by any means, but it was a more-than-memorable romp through a unique Christmas setting.

List of Christmas Movies, Ranked

28. The Snowman (1982)

Watching The Snowman feels like entering a dreamscape. Its intricate, pencil-drawn animation and gorgeous score by Howard Blake combine for a transcendent experience. By the time it reaches its now-iconic song, “Walking in the Air,” you’ll feel fully enveloped in its winter wonderland.

Based on the children’s book by Raymond Briggs, the twenty-six minute film premiered on the British Channel 4. It has since become a yuletide staple in England, playing on the Channel 4 each Christmas Eve. 

Excelent Christmas Movies

27. Scrooge (1951)

Brian Desmond Hurst’s Scrooge, or as it’s known to American audiences A Christmas Carol, is widely regarded as the best pure cinematic adaptation of Dickens’ novel of the same name.

Alastair Sim delivers a great performance in the lead role of Ebenezer Scrooge, channeling the character’s signature misanthropy with believable precision. Scrooge may have been better suited for the stage than the screen but the latter result still impresses.

Romantic Christmas Movies to Watch

26. The Holiday (2006)

There are hundreds if not thousands of Christmas rom-coms, but few are better than The Holiday. Nancy Meyers’ contemporary Christmas classic is a breezy double love-story, aided by some great performances from Cameron Diaz, Kate Winslet, Jude Law and Jack Black.

If you’re looking for a story about winter romance, then The Holiday may be the movie for you – followed closely behind by Ron Underwood’s Holiday in Handcuffs.

Christmas in Technicolor

25. We’re No Angels (1955)

Who doesn’t love a good Charlie Brown holiday special? For many, it’s impossible to look back on Charlie Brown cartoons without feeling a strong sense of nostalgia.

No doubt Holiday Inn is most famous for introducing the world to “White Christmas” (though, notably, the producers of the film thought “Be Careful, It’s My Heart” would be the hit song from the film). And while that duet by Bing Crosby and Marjorie Reynold that ends the movie is undeniably powerful, Holiday Inn has much more to offer.

First, there’s Fred Astaire, who performs some of his finest dance numbers in the film. Second, the film’s love story is heartwarming and compelling, a conventional but affecting Christmas-y narrative. Of course, this is all elevated by a stellar score by Irving Berlin, who in 1942 was at the peak of his powers.

Stop-Motion Holidays

22. The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Christmas Day Movies to Watch

21. Love Actually (2003)

At 2 ½ hours long, you might think that audiences would turn away from Love Actually. But due to some serious sentimentality and a great ensemble cast, Love Actually has developed a cult following.

Love Actually boasts an all-star cast that features heavy hitters like Hugh Grant, Keira Knightley, Liam Neeson, Colin Firth, Emma Thompson, Alan Rickman, Laura Linney and Bill Nighy. As Nighy’s character sings, “Christmas is all around us.”

Wild Christmas Remake

20. How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000)

Classic Christmas Movies

19. Home Alone (1990)

Home Alone brought Christmas movies back into the limelight when it was released in 1990. This John Hughes-written, Chris Columbus-directed Christmas classic grossed more than 25x its budget at the box-office and inspired countless remakes and sequels.

With an off-the-wall cast that includes Joe Pesci, Catherine O’Hara and John Candy, it’s no surprise that Home Alone is zany fun. Oh, and of course Home Alone is the film that helped launch the careers of Macaulay and Kieran Culkin.

Christmas Horror Special

18. Black Christmas (1974)

Black Christmas may not be a Christmas movie you watch every year, but it’s one of the most influential Christmas movies ever made. You’d be hard-pressed to find many slasher film directors who weren’t heavily influenced by Black Christmas.

Black Christmas follows a group of sorority girls who are picked off one-by-one by a psychopathic killer on – you guessed it – Christmas. A fascinating bit of trivia is that this is not director Bob Clark's only classic Christmas movie. He also directed the perennial favorite A Christmas Story, which we'll see later in this list.

Classic Christmas Movies to Watch

17. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (1964)

Perhaps it’s best to look back at Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer through rose-colored glasses. There’s no doubt that revisiting Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer made me realize it was much more strange than I remembered.

Rudolph is a story about a social outcast reindeer who’s exiled to the Island of Misfit toys. Whew, that doesn’t sound good. But hey, at least he’s brought back into the fold when they need him to guide Santa’s sled through a storm!

List of Christmas Movies, Ranked

16. Trading Places (1983)

Dan Akroyd and Eddie Murphy star in Trading Places as two men at opposite ends of the economic ladder who are swapped out into each other’s lives as part of a nefarious social experiment. Trading Places takes place during the Christmas season and the exorbitant displays of Holiday commercialization are on full display.

What would happen if an ordinary man accidentally killed Santa Claus and was forced to inherit his responsibilities? Well, as it turns out, a whole lot of Yuletide hi-jinks and interpersonal turmoil.

The Santa Clause, yes, clause as in “binding agreement,” is about a man who becomes the patron saint of giving after indirectly killing Santa. The Santa Clause performed well at the box-office and inspired two direct sequels.

Classic Christmas Movies

14. The Bishop’s Wife (1947)

It’s hard to go wrong with a movie that features Cary Grant and Loretta Young, so it should come as no surprise that their Christmas movie The Bishop’s Wife was great. 

The Bishop’s Wife was remade by Penny Marshall in 1996, with Denzel Washington and Whitney Houston taking up Grant and Loretta’s roles respectively. Marshall’s remake was well-received but it didn’t hold a candle to the original. 

Most Popular Christmas Movies

13. Scrooged (1988)

Richard Donner’s remake of A Christmas Carol, Scrooged, is a nightmarish reimagining of Dickens’ original. I suppose the original was pretty nightmarish as well, but Donner really turned the gothic filter up to 11 with some freaky visuals in Scrooged.

Scrooged marked Bill Murray’s return to Hollywood after a four-year hiatus in the mid-'80s – ultimately reigniting a career that’s dominated the box-office for decades.

Best Christmas Movies of All Time

12. Joyeux Noel (2006)

Many historians argue that World War I was the most preventable war of the 20th century. It wasn’t uncommon for soldiers on both sides to ask: “what exactly are we fighting for?” So it’s easy to understand that in 1914, at the onset of the Great War, opposing armies laid down their weapons to celebrate Christmas Eve together.

Family Drama on Christmas

11. A Christmas Tale (2008)

Renowned French filmmaker Arnaud Desplechin’s A Christmas Tale is a moving portrait of a family united by tragic circumstance in the Christmas season. 

The film received rave reviews upon its 2008 release, with Roger Ebert saying that “A Christmas Tale skates on thin ice across a crowded lake, arrives safely on the far shore, and shares a cup of hot cocoa and marshmallows with Death.”

Top 10 Christmas Movies

10. Metropolitan (1990)

Most Christmas movies explore the holiday season through the perspective of the middle-class, but what about the metropolitans? Well, as it turns out, as with most other things, Christmas giving isn’t much of a concern.

Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan is a satire film about the upper-class. It’s not quite as scathing as other films that take similar satirical aims, like American Psycho and The Exterminating Angel, but it is still deeply impactful.

List of Christmas Movies, Ranked

9. Klaus (2019)

Klaus is one of the most beautifully animated Christmas films ever made. The video above expertly shows how the animators used lighting techniques to enrich the depth of images and create the facade of a third-dimension.

Is it a Christmas Movie?

8. Die Hard (1988)

If you ask 100 people who just watched Die Hard whether they think it’s a Christmas movie or not, you’d probably get an even split. Die Hard may not be a prototypical Christmas movie but it does take place in the Christmas season, and it is structured around the events of the holiday.

If you ask me, Die Hard is a Christmas movie; and it’s a dang good one at that. The late Alan Rickman gives one of the best performances of his career in the film as the maniacal Hans Gruber.

Classic Christmas Movies

7. Elf (2003)

As the years go by and Christmas turns from a holiday of gift-receiving to gift-giving, some start to resent the economic and social burden of the yuletide season – for James Caan’s character, Walter, in Elf, that’s exactly what happens.

But when Walter’s long-lost son (Will Ferrell) arrives and proclaims that he’s an elf, the whole concept of “Christmas” is put on trial. In the end, Elf proves to be a Christmas classic for audiences of all ages.

Best Christmas Movies of All Time

6. About a Boy (2002)

About A Boy may just be the quintessential Hugh Grant movie. The King of the Rom Com’s fastball is on full display in the 2002 film– he’s a grump, but a sweet one; a scoundrel, but a loveable one. Nick Hornby’s character, an aimless man coasting on the royalties from a Christmas song his dad wrote, is made for Grant.

Sure, About A Boy isn’t overtly a holiday movie. But the film’s most pivotal scenes take place at Christmas, and the protagonist’s arc is that of Scrooge. He’s cynical and isolated in the beginning, and loving and appreciative of found family in the end. What’s more Christmas-y than that?

John Hughes took the screenwriting maxim “take a typical situation and muck it up” to heart with National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. Just about everything that could go wrong in Christmas Vacation, does – which makes the 100-minute film blaze by.

Christmas Vacation isn’t just regarded as one of the best Christmas movies, it’s considered one of best comedies of all-time. Jump into the car with the Griswolds and enjoy the ride (just don’t ask too many questions).

Top 10 Christmas Movies

4. The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)

Call me crazy, but I think The Muppets deserve a feature-length movie for every holiday. There’s certainly no shortage of Muppets movies, but it’s hard to think there shouldn’t be more.

The Muppet Christmas Carol takes Charles Dickens’ classic story and injects new life into it with characters like Kermit the Frog and sharp writing from Jerry Juhl. 

I don’t know what’s more of a miracle: screenwriter George Seaton taking a Macy’s ad and turning it into a feature length movie or the fact that a Macy’s ad was able to become one of the best Christmas movies of all time.

I know Macy’s didn’t directly finance Miracle on 34th Street but for all intents and purposes, the film plays out like an ad for the department store. That’s not to say that it’s a bad movie by any means. Quite the contrary, Miracle on 34th Street is a Christmas classic due to some sharp writing and great lead performances – just don’t be fooled by its marketing motives.

My Favorite Christmas Movies

1. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)

Perhaps it’s trite to say It’s a Wonderful Life is the very best Christmas movie, but few would argue otherwise. We don’t often get holiday-centric films from the world’s best directors, so the fact that the incomparable Frank Capra directed It’s a Wonderful Life makes it all the more special.

It’s a Wonderful Life combines all of the best aspects of storytelling and filmmaking with an abundance of Christmas spirit. But perhaps its most enduring aspect is the humanity at its core; as Clarence says “Strange, isn't it? Each man's life touches so many other lives.”