Ah, Christmas. For those who celebrate, this festive time of year is a time for giving gifts, decorating our living spaces with colorful lights, and arguing with our loved ones about movies. So, in keeping with this oh-so-noble Yuletide tradition, let us examine everyone’s favorite Christmas movie, John McTiernan’s 1988 action film “Die Hard,” starring Bruce Willis.
The film follows off-duty police officer John McClane as he foils the insidious plot of the German terrorist Hans Gruber, who seizes control of Nakatomi Plaza during one of the company’s lavish parties. What begins as any corporate celebration quickly turns into a high-stakes hostage scenario, leaving McClane, armed with grit, gallows humor, and no shoes, to single-handedly dismantle Gruber’s operation. Big explosions, gunfights, and panicked FBI agents ensue as McClane crawls through vents, improvises his weapons, and generally makes life miserable for every ne’er-do-well in a twenty-story radius. It is a tight, frantic, expertly constructed thriller, arguably one of the best films of its era.
Sounds like a typical late-80s action flick. However, one may ask, why is this movie a Christmas movie? Well, obviously, it is because it just so happens to be set during Christmas.
So naturally, we arrive at our bulletproof definition of what warrants a Christmas movie: any film featuring the holiday, regardless of tone, setting, message, or plot, is undoubtedly included. Yes, among the ranks of such classics as “Home Alone,” “It’s a Wonderful Life,” and “Klaus” is, most certainly, “Die Hard.”
However, following this definition, what must we include next? What other films feature the holiday that one would not ever consider a Christmas movie? For starters, Richard Donner’s 1987 thriller “Lethal Weapon,” starring Mel Gibson and Danny Glover. The film follows two officers from the Los Angeles Police Department investigating the death of a young woman around Christmas. It even has “Jingle Bell Rock” in the opening! Perfect, it fits our definition, and thus, is included. Next, Sylvester Stallone’s 1985 sports drama “Rocky IV,” featuring Sylvester Stallone and the City of Philadelphia, follows Rocky Balboa as he takes on Soviet boxer Ivan Drago in a fight on Christmas Day. It fits and is thus included. What else? Sir Ridley Scott’s “Prometheus,” Mary Harron’s “American Psycho,” Steven Spielberg’s “Catch Me If You Can,” Joe Dante’s “Gremlins,” Shane Black’s “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang” and “Iron Man 3,” Terrence Malick’s “The Thin Red Line,” Terry Gilliam’s “Brazil,” and Stanley Kubrick’s “Eyes Wide Shut.”
Under our current definition, these are Christmas movies. Let us zoom out a bit and examine what it means for the Christmas genre as a whole. Alongside Rankin/Bass and “The Muppet’s Christmas Carol,” we must then include a gritty action thriller, a buddy-cop shoot-em-up, a Cold War boxing drama, a bleak sci-fi horror, a satirical psychological slasher, a breezy cat-and-mouse crime comedy, a neo-noir detective film, a superhero blockbuster, a philosophical war epic, and an erotic drama. Such a diverse selection to choose from in Christmas cinema, all thanks to the magic of a calendar date.
Putting my sarcasm aside, let me be clear. The point of separating films into genres is to be able to talk about them in a meaningful way, to understand what they are trying to do, how they make us feel, and what expectations they set before we even press play. A Christmas movie is not just any story that happens to be set during late December, and anyone pretending that this is the case is doing a bit. Zero people actually think “Rocky IV” or “Prometheus” are Christmas movies. A Christmas movie is a film that uses the season as part of its emotional fabric, the themes it conveys, and the message at the end. Christmas movies are meant to be watched under a blanket with hot cocoa and a fireplace. They are cozy, silly, heartwarming films that make one feel like a kid again. When we flatten this distinction to treat “set during Christmas” as a sole criterion, the label stops helping us understand anything at all and just becomes pure noise. When “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” and “Eyes Wide Shut” are included in the same genre, the genre is meaningless. So to all who celebrate, enjoy some authentic Christmas movies and leave the debates with Thanksgiving where they belong. Happy holidays!