Alongside the food and the gifts and the quality family time, Christmas also means one other big thing, and that is movie heaven! We all have our own festive favorites that have been part of the seasonal tradition from childhood, but have you ever stopped to think about whether the films you watch at this time of year are actually Christmassy or not? You’d be surprised by how many festive favorites are not really thematically linked at all! Here are some Christmas movies that aren’t really Christmas movies but we still love anyway!
Sure, Die Hard is set around Christmas time, but we all know that it is classic festive fun! Nonetheless, it enjoys a steady rotation in many households at this time of year because it provides something different and more blood pumping than that other movies that families like to sit down and enjoy together.
Tim Burton’s take on the Batman franchise is another movie set during Christmas, whilst at the same time having little to do with Christmas at all! We get a few fun decorations and festive aesthetics here and there, but really it’s all about Michael Keaton, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Danny DeVito being absolute comic book badasses!
I can’t be the only one that feels this about Lord Of The Rings? It’s the perfect trilogy to settle down with over the festive period, and the largely snowy backdrop of the series help it to feel appropriately seasonal. It always helps that pretty much every TV network under the sun decides to air it at this time of the year too!
Such a great set of movies to watch at Christmas and what we love is the chance to see Hogwarts all dressed for the festive season. No matter that it's probably a little dark and that's why it isn't really a Christmas movie.
The third instalment of Robert Downey Jr. playing the charismatic Iron Man is set at Christmas, which is all the excuse you need to add to the pile of movies to watch over the holidays. Tony even gets Pepper an unnecessarily giant bear as a present and we can all relate to that, right!?
Some of its more violent content might not be immediately relatable to Christmas, but this action classic begins with Jingle Bell Rock and finishes with a family gathered around a beautifully decorated tree. That’s Christmassy enough in my book!
This can almost be called a Christmas movie as Gizmo is a gift from father to son and we get to see lots of snow as well as all the shenanigans of those crazy gremlins. And, let's not forget the scene of the gremlins "singing" Christmas carols.
We all love a good romance at Christmas, so if you fancy something other than Love Actually, why not give You’ve Got Mail a go? It’s a Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks classic, and features Meg herself decorating a lovely tree as snow falls all around, with everyone singing carols at a piano!
There is something deliciously seasonal about Edward Scissorhands. It’s a beautiful, weird, wonderful love story that also features a tonne of festive references. Not to mention the unforgettable scene when Edward makes it ‘snow’ for Kim!