Top Five: Christmas Movies!

As you know, I love the holiday season. One of my favorite things to do is cozy up on the couch with Travis and the pugs and watch Christmas movies by the light of the Christmas tree. Here are our favorites:

1. Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer: Like everyone else I grew up watching this on tv every year. Last year I took the plunge and bought my own copy. This one is such a classic, I love the songs, I love the stop motion animation, I love the unlikely dentist side plot. I even love the weird noise Rudolph's nose makes when it lights up. The Bumble is the cutest I think, though my mom told me when she was a kid it made her cry!
2. A Colbert Christmas: The Greatest Gift of All: Chock full of hilarious weird songs and cameos I like to watch this special a few times every season. The Toby Keith number makes me crack up every time, and Travis and I love to sing the John Legend gem "Nutmeg." And then there is the Colbert and John Stewart duet "Can I Interest You in Channukah?" We've been listening to it while we drive around doing our Christmas shopping. I just have one gift left to buy!
3. Love, Actually: I'm kind of embarrassed that I love this movie so much? I don't know why because I'm not embarrassed about much lamer interests. If you haven't seen it, it is a movie featuring about every British actor you know of, and has all kinds of interwoven stories about love and Christmas. We were just watching it while I was typing this and I cried about five times. It's just so lovely. This is one of those we'll watch during the year sometimes. I think my favorite story is the guy in love with his best friend's wife, or the guy who goes to America to meet girls, or the aging rock star with the lame Christmas single. It's just all so good! (This one barely nudged out The Holiday for top five status. Jack Black needs to be a romantic lead more often! Haha. )
4. The Nightmare Before Christmas: My grandma gave me a VHS copy of this for Christmas when it came out and I was OBSESSED. I watched it every day for weeks until my mom hid it from me. I was always into things that were a little weird, even as a kid (I blame Pee Wee's playhouse). This one is another watch all year favorite. I have a big collection of figures from this movie, and the soundtrack on tape, and picture vinyl, and cd. Beautiful stop motion, great songs, wonderful sweet story about getting in a rut and finding yourself again and not being afraid to fail, and vampires! And a ghost dog! I'm sure you've seen it, but if not go find a copy immediately.
5. Christmas Vacation:  I had to put this one in the top five just because I've probably seen it the most. Like I said the other day, it is Travis' favorite movie of all time and we watch it a lot. It is still funny to me after exactly 1 million viewings. My favorite part is when Clark tells the kids that he heard Santa had been spotted on the radio and Cousin Eddie looks at him deadpan and says "You serious Clark?". I still laugh out loud!

Here are some movies that were close to being in the top five. When I was a kid I had a little cardboard cut out of Ernest in my room. Another weirdo that I loved.  Home Alone is the first movie I can remember going to see in the theater!Of course A Christmas Story has to be in there, and The Muppet Christmas Carol is very nostalgic to me. I feel like it's up there with the original Muppet movie, but I think I'm in the minority on that one. We listen to the John Denver and the Muppets Christmas album every Christmas morning. Magical!

What are your favorites? You would think I would have more classic Christmas movies on my list, but I really haven't seen that many. We're going to see It's a Wonderful Life at the local indie theater, and it might be my first time watching it all the way through!