Christmas Movies

RHYS BOWEN:  Christmas movies–love them or hate them? 

I don't mean the Hallmark Christmas movies where the high powered New York lawyer with failed romance/writer with writer's block/ moves back to a small town to help her grandmother/run a store/save the town from developers and meets a lumberjack (who is really a renowned doctor/writer or country vet or the developer who becomes good.  I mean real movies.

I always have certain movies I have to watch each year, to get me into the holiday spirit. This year I have watched:

It’s a Wonderful Life. I always walk away feeling annoyed that Mr. Potter didn’t get his just desserts. But it is warm and fuzzy and says a good message.

A Christmas Carol. Ye olde version in black and white. My favorite is Scrooge with Albert Finney but I couldn’t find it anywhere on Netflix or Prime. I just enjoy watching the Cratchetts being so happy and loving and Tiny Tim being saved.

White Christmas: Although this is not a white Christmas until the very end and although Bing Crosby is over fifty at the time of filming while Rosemary Clooney is only 24 I still enjoy the schmalz. And the dancing.

The Holiday: It’s quite improbable and if I wanted to trade houses I would never get a house in Beverly Hills or a cottage with a handsome brother nearby, but I love it anyway.

Love Actually: Why is this my favorite? There is so much that’s annoying–Hugh Grant dancing. The embarrassing porno movie. The British guy in America. AND a writer who doesn’t back up what he’s writing but lets it be blown into a lake? What sort of writer does that? But… that scene with Emma Thompson crying as she listens to the CD is one of the most moving I’ve ever seen. And the guy with the cue cards at the door. Brilliant. Worth watching over and over.

Movies I will not watch: Rudolph. What kind of kindly old Santa would discriminate against a reindeer who was “different’? And what message is that sending–shunned and mocked because he had a red nose? 

Home Alone. Can’t handle the thought of people not missing their child.

Movies I didn’t see but love: A Charlie Brown Christmas.

Miracle of 34th Street.

So how about you? What are your favorite holiday movies? Any that you hate?

HALLIE EPHRON: I have never seen DIE HARD. Or HOME ALONE. I know lots of people rate those at the top of the Christmas movies list. I do like LOVE ACTUALLY so much that when it’s over I watch it again. There’s some nice Christms bits in YOU’VE GOT MAIL.

A Charlie Brown Christmas? Feh. 

HANK PHILLIPI RYAN: I'm on the fence about Love, Actually, but I do love the "just in cases" part. (And he had a TYPEWRITER, okay, that's how he was.) And I thought Hugh Grant dancing was really funny, but he would NEVER have been PM. Oh, and his surprisingly-talented aide caroling, that was great.  (And, the cue cards are sweet, but REALLY? What's he trying to do, make her re-think her wedding? Nope.)  We could really talk about his whole movie, because it's either wonderful or cringey.

Christmas in Connecticut is fun--Barbara Stanwyck as a chic "homemaker" columnist who is a total fraud. Love that. Oh, and what's the one where they dance and topple the couch? Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn?  Holiday, right? Fabulous.

It's A Wonderful Life— well, it always seemed really too sad and almost disturbing to me. (Am I being awful about this?) White Christmas, sure (the dresses and the technicolor!), but I don't really need to watch it ever again. And A Christmas Carol--I recently re-read a lot of the book, and it is absolutely wonderful. Wonderful! 

Is Sleepless in Seattle Christmas? Or is that New Years? And When Harry met Sally, that's new year's, right? AND An Affair to Remember. (Is THAT New Years?)   I think I like new year's movies better. Hmm. Is this humbuggy?

JENN McKINLAY: It’s a Wonderful Life is my all time fave. I just think everyone has their George Bailey on the bridge moment but no one is ever honest about it. Seems way ahead of its time to me :) I love Love Actually - even with the ridiculous writer (it’s Colin Firth which  makes it forgivable) besides Emma Thompson steals the movie anyway. A Christmas Carol but with Alistair Simm is a tradition for us. We attend Christmas Eve service, go home and make pizza, and watch that version of the movie. I enjoy Charlie Brown but my all time fave is The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Never should have been a movie, it was perfect as is, also, this new trend on social media of people having a Grinch break into their house and steal presents in front of the kids to what - terrify them? - really disturbs me.

LUCY BURDETTE : Oh, we have just tonight been watching love actually! We watched the first half and will finish it tomorrow. I think Hugh Grant dancing is hysterical, about half of the movie is wonderful. The stepfather talking with his bereaved stepson is priceless, Emma Thompson is amazing, and I do love the scene where Colin Firth goes to propose to the Portuguese woman. Not a fan of the Q cards! Lol all in all, love the movie and love saving it for the Christmas season. Ditto on you’ve got Mail. 

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Hank, I didn’t know there were any other Christmas In Connecticut fans! It’s one of my favorites, and often what I watch while wrapping gifts, because I could never get the rest of the family into it.

Also: Die Hard. Yes, this is our family’s traditional Christmas Eve must-watch movie. It’s a little odd going from Bruce Willis mowing down bad guys to Midnight Mass, but we make it work. It’s the perfect counterbalance to all the sweetness and schmaltz of the season.

DEBORAH CROMBIE: I just now pulled all the Christmas DVDs out of a box–now if I can figure out how to play them with our new TV and the myriad remotes!! I have to confess that I have never seen Home Alone–how is that possible? Maybe this year. I think I was always horrified by the idea that a parent could forget their child. We do watch Die Hard. I think it was Alan Rickman's first big Hollywood part (as the bad guy, for anyone who's never seen it) and I fell utterly in love with him. I love A Christmas Story–I even went to visit the Christmas Story house in Cleveland. And It's a Wonderful Life. But my two must watch holiday movies are Love Actually and The Holiday. Hope to get them both in this year.

RHYS: have we missed any? Any other favorites or hates?

The Reds Share Favorite Christmas Movies

RHYS BOWEN: I’ve been scouring the TV listings for any of my favorite Christmas movies and do far nothing!
Do you have a particular movie that says to you “ okay, now it’s really Christmas?”

I have several: It’s a Wonderful Life”( I always cry) Love Actually ( although it always annoys me
when Liam Nielsen lets the boy push past airport security. I think he’s going to be shot until I remind
myself that it’s London and they don’t shoot people), and White Christmas are my favorites.

I almost forgot a Charlie Brown Christmas and Linus makes me cry at the end.

I also like Scrooge with Albert Finney but it’s not often on any more.
I quite enjoy The Santa Clause, especially when the obnoxious psychiatrist goes all starry eyed
and says , “Santa?”

The only one I’ve seen so far is Rudolph and I was interested to see a piece in a newspaper blasting
The bullying. I so agree. What a message—that Santa tells Dasher he should be ashamed
for having a son who is different? And the coach won’t let him play? And only the young bucks get to fly?
  Sorry. Time to retire that one

Elf makes me embarrassed. Home Alone terrifies me,

Am I too sensitive?  So how about you? What movie do you have to see each year?
And are there any good Hanukkah movies out there?

JENN McKINLAY: I love Scrooge with Albert Finney, but also A Christmas Carol with Alistair Simm, It’s a Wonderful Life, Love Actually, White Christmas...check, check, check! We can movie buddies, Rhys! I do love Charlie Brown’s Christmas and as a child of the 70’s and 80’s,

I love A Year Without a Santa Claus (Heat Miser v. Freeze Miser) and The Grinch (animated).

And, of course, the best Xmas movie of all time...Die Hard. LOL! Come at me!

RHYS: Oh yes… I remember the Heat Miser. I’m Mr. Heat Miser, I’m Mr. Snow etc. Good one.

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I'm not big on Christmas movies--I mean, It's A Wonderful Life, sure, but I can say it word for word,  and DIE HARD, which I adore,Jenn, every time, but I wouldn't stop what I was doing to watch it. I've never seen ELF, because it looks--too dumb. (I know, I'm jumping to conclusions.) I used to LOVE  Love, Actually, and I still do, but I made the mistake of reading an article which explained why I shouldn't like it, and it had some points. There's Thin Man, too--doesn't one of them take place at Christmas?

OH! I know, I know, and yes, you MUST all see this, seriously, find it.  It's called--The Man Who Invented Christmas. It's about how Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol. Seriously. truly, it is wonderful, and an absolute writer movie. Trust me, it's terrific. I am going to go find it right now.

LUCY BURDETTE: I am with Hank, I am not a big re-watcher of Christmas movies, movies in general I’d say. I did notice that National Lampoon’s Christmas vacation is going to be showing at the local Key West cinema. I’m kind of tempted by that.

DEBORAH CROMBIE: I absolutely must watch Love Actually. I know you can find fault with it, but I don't care, I still love it. And I listen to the soundtrack! I try to get in a viewing of It's a Wonderful Life, and I love A Christmas Story. I've even been to the house in Cleveland that was used for the set. Last year we watched Die Hard, which we hadn't seen in years, and thoroughly enjoyed it. You have to root for Bruce Willis.

But my very favorite Christmas movie is The Holiday, with Kate Winslet, Jude Law, Jack Black, and Cameron Diaz, written, produced, and directed by Nancy Meyer, fabulous score by Hans Zimmer. If you haven't seen this, it's a must.

Oh, and Rhys, I'm glad to know I'm not the only terrified by Home Alone. I can't watch it!

HALLIE EPHRON:  I’ve never seen Die Hard but I do have a soft spot for A Christmas Story. And You’ve Got Mail. And of course Love Actually. But I do love to haul out ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas and A Child’s Christmas in Wales for a read aloud. And the Dr. Seuss book about the Grinch. Looking forward to celebrating this holiday with our grandkids.

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I do love Christmas movies, and they’re a tradition in our family. (Watching movies together is a big thing for us year-round, and we have certain films we always and ever only see at one date or another.) I’ll suggest three: My personal fave is CHRISTMAS IN CONNECTICUT, the 1945 original, not the dreadful 1992 remake. Glamorous, funny Barbara Stanwick has to fake being the WWII era Martha Stewart at her all-too-eager to wed boyfriend’s house in snowy, rural Connecticut - despite the fact she can’t boil water. Will her publisher find out? Will she realize the handsome war hero she’s hosting is really the man for her? Will she stick the pancake-flipping? 

My second suggestion is another romantic comedy, but of a more recent vintage - HOLIDAY IN HANDCUFFS. Melissa Joan Hart, the perpetual screw-up in her picture-perfect family, is so desperate when her fiance dumps her right before the family Christmas vacation, she kidnaps Mario Lopez and introduces him as her boyfriend. The screenplay actually makes the insane premise work, and along with laughs and sighs, you get fabulous winter cabin p*rn and Mario Lopez wearing nothing but a towel.


My final recommendation is THE CHRISTMAS CHRONICLES, which came out on Netflix last year. It’s campy and corny, but has gee-whizz special effects and an AMAZING performance by Kurt Russel, starring as a Santa you wouldn’t mind handing your stocking to, if you know what I mean, and I think you do.

RHYS: So who has a favorite Christmas movie to recommend? Who has to watch a particular Christmas movie?

All right, once and for all, are these Christmas movies or not?

JENN McKINLAY: Every year a debate looms large in my house over certain movies and whether they are actually Christmas movies. Admittedly, I am a soft touch. If there are some holiday lights and carols being sung, I'm gonna say it's a Christmas movie. There are others in my house who are bigger sticklers. So, let's hash it out. Here are the five most debated movies in no particular order. Reds, do you consider them Christmas movies or no?

1. DIE HARD

2. GREMLINS

3. LOVE ACTUALLY

4. HOME ALONE

5. TRADING PLACES

Let the heated arguments and popcorn throwing commence!











HALLIE EHRON: I am embarrassed to say, I have only seen one of these. LOVE ACTUALLY. Which I love, actually, and is for me the perfect deliciously silly Christmas movie. I'd add A CHRISTMAS STORY, with its “Little Orphan Annie” decoder ring, a triple-dog dare on the schoolyard and the Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot Range Model air rifle... and the leg lamp. 

RHYS BOWEN: I've seen them all, except for Die Hard, for which you'd have to tie me to a chair and gag me to make me watch it. Home Alone was a Christmas movie but not my cup of tea. I personalize too much when children are in bad situations. But I do love LOVE ACTUALLY. I watch it every year. There are so many poignant threads going through it. It is true and real and touching. (apart from Hugh Grant trying to dance).

JENN: I like Hugh's dancing. Don't judge me!

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I've never seen Home Alone--well, wait, I guess I've seen parts of it, which have the kid outwitting dumb burglars and it's all very prat-fally. I keep thinking, why would he be home alone? I know there's some reason, but meh.  Gremlins and Trading Places, I have not seen one frame of them. Am I completely out of it? Die Hard--LOVE. Love that movie, It has everything: party, family, bad guys, suspense, hostages. Everything you need for the holidays. Love it. And Love actually? LOVE. Love! When he says: You learned English? And she says: Just in cases? Awwww.

DEBORAH CROMBIE: 
1. Die Hard, definitely! Rhys, you might like it better than you think.
2.Gremlins, have to admit I've never seen it. Even the ads gave me the creeps.
3.Trading Places, yes, and love this movie. I'd never seen it until a couple of years ago, when Rick MADE me watch it. Now it's on my yearly list.
4.Love Actually, well, duh. Best Christmas movie ever. Is it time to watch it yet?
5.Home Alone, another one I have to admit I've never seen. I just couldn't get around the kid being left in the house. Should I reconsider?

LUCY BURDETTE: You're forcing me to rethink watching the first three, which I've never seen. LOVE ACTUALLY, definitely, no one would argue any differently. I haven't seen HOME ALONE for maybe 25 years. But it was one of our son's favorites so we saw it more than once back in those days. He had all the parts memorized and would parrot them back to us. I still use this line from time to time: "There has to be a way to find twenty-thousand dollars!"

Well, how about it, Readers? What do you think of the most debated holiday movies? Yea or nay?

A Week of Goodbyes

DEBORAH CROMBIE: What a week. First, David Bowie, dead at 69, just three days after releasing his final album.  Then, Thursday, Alan Rickman, also dead at 69, also from cancer.

The mourning for David Bowie here in the UK has been enormous and public. He was not only a talented artist, but an icon, a hero to generations of those who felt different. Hundreds of people gathered around the mural painted on the side of Morley's department store in Brixton (his birthplace), singing, crying, and leaving flower tributes. There have been retrospectives in every newspaper and every television station.

But while I shared in the nostalgia, I didn't have a huge emotional connection to Bowie.

Alan Rickman was a different matter. I ADORED Alan Rickman. From the first time I saw him, stealing the screen as Hans Gruber in Die Hard. He played the good, the bad, the silly, the complicated, all with such joy and finesse. (And, yes, you can play villains joyously, if you are Alan Rickman...) Some of the performances I loved best: Jamie, the dead cellist in Anthony Minghella's Truly, Madly, Deeply; The deliciously evil Sheriff of Nottingham in Robin Hood, Price of Theives; Bad Harry in Love Actually; and of course, the multi-layered Severus Snape in the Harry Potter films. JK Rowling has said she had Rickman in mind from the beginning. She certainly wrote Snape for him from the time he was cast in the first film. They grew into one another, Snape and Rickman, and Rickman always knew what part Snape was meant to play. 

There are too many more movies to name. I only wish I'd seen him on the stage. That voice, so instantly recognizable in film--can you imagine having heard  him live?

Actor friends of mine in London have described him as kind, generous, and funny. He was actor's actor, a pro, never a movie star.

I am heartbroken at his passing.

REDS, have these deaths hit you hard, too? 

HALLIE EPHRON: I agree, it was a tough week. Huge talents. Gone.

What strikes me so about David Bowie's music is how much he's a storyteller (Major Tom to Ground Control...) and a brave one at that. Alan Rickman was one of my all time favorite actors. Love Actually! Of course. And he made Professor Snape human. And a brilliant comedian (check out one of my favorite silly great movies, Galaxy Quest). He was one of those performers that you felt like you knew personally.
 
RHYS BOWEN: I was shocked, but not overwhelmingly shocked by David Bowie's passing. After all, one suspects that rock stars have toyed with drugs during their lives. They certainly lived stressful lives, touring, performing late at night, coping with public adoration. I'll always think of David Bowie as the evil being in Labyrinth. He scared my kids so much. 

But then to read about Alan Rickman only a few days later was shattering to me. I always had such a soft spot for Colonel Brandon in Sense and Sensibility. Poor noble guy, always trying to do the right thing, but luckily triumphing in the end for once. And then Love Actually, not such a good guy. And Snape--what a wonderful character.  It's events like these that remind me how transient life is and how foolish it is to waste a single moment worrying about unimportant things.At least these two leave a legacy!

LUCY BURDETTE: I was a huge David Bowie fan. I went to see him at the Tower Theater in Philadelphia in the early seventies. His performance and costumes were electric! (And I confess to ducking into the men's room with my pals to smoke LOL.) I know all the words to the songs of that era, but my favorite is ch-ch-ch-changes.

Most amazing was how hard he worked in his last year and a half. He was deathly ill and yet fiercely productive. I am in awe of that. I would have probably just laid on the couch...

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: When we saw the new star wars movie, as soon as I saw Kylo Ren, I thought--oh, twenty years ago, that character would have been played by Alan Rickman. He had such a look, and such a brand, and so inhabited his characters. You could always see why he was chosen for each part. And we loved him for that. And right, Rhys, he was so awful/hateful/perfect in Love, Actually.

As for David Bowie. Ground Control to Major Tom (Space Oddity) is the SADDEST song ever. It's a top ten for me. I wasn't so attached to him personally, I was in a different era, but I bow to his constant motion, and re-invention. He was always exploring--music, and himself, and boundaries of it all.

Both men handled it so gracefully at the end.  May we all be as caring and careful and elegant--and strive to leave even a fraction of their legacy.  And yes, every day matters.   "Check ignition, and may God's love be with you..."


DEBS: You are all so spot on. Storytellers, both in their own ways, whether by creating characters or inhabiting them. And so graceful, both of them.

Dear READERS, do you have a favorite Bowie song, or a favorite Rickman film? Share with us, please.

Merry Christmas at the Movies

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: It's the holiday season, as the song goes, and for many of us, that means it's time to pull out the old videos/dvds or to start streaming favorite holiday movies. 

Christmas flicks - and let's face it, they are almost all about

Christmas - tend to fall into three categories. The first are the movies that you must watch or it will not be Christmas this year. Prominently featured on this list will be old Rankin-Bass stop-motion animation and George Bailey exclaiming, "Zuzu's petals!"

The second are the movies you enjoy because they put you in the mood - flicks to watch while wrapping presents or signing cards. There are a lot of Hallmark Holiday specials on this list, as well as movies that are must-sees for your kids, but that came around too late for you to really cleave to. ELF, I'm talking about you.

The third are the pictures that subvert the holidays, with murder, double-crossing and Bruce Willis blowing stuff up while canned Christmas music plays in the background. Look for Santa with a sawed-off shotgun or the hero saying with curled lip, "Now it's a silent night."

Sometime these movies cross over to different lists. For my husband and son, THE GODFATHER is absolutely required pre-Christmas viewing. For my daughters and me, HOLIDAY IN HANDCUFFS, a delightfully silly romance with Melissa Joan Hart, is our must-see-or-baby-Jesus-will-cry movie. Also on my have-to-have-it list: CHRISTMAS IN CONNECTICUT, which no one else in my family wants to watch. I always wind up wrapping presents while swooning over Barbara Stanwick and Dennis Morgan. (I saw the 1992 remake once. It was...not good.)




For my Christmas subversive movie, nothing tops REINDEER GAMES,  a twisty caper movie/mystery starring Ben Affleck as The Sap and Charlize Theron as The Dame.
  As for present-wrapping/napkin ironing/silver polishing fare - well, that's what Netflix is for. I willingly stream movies I wouldn't take a second glance at if they weren't set at Christmas time. If it features a romance, an adoptable dog, and a kid who needs a family, I'm in egg nog-sodden heaven.






How about you, Reds? What are your holiday must-sees?

RHYS BOWEN: My must sees have now been seen so the season has officially kicked off. One is IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE and the other is WHITE CHRISTMAS. Both oldies but goodies. I still get weepy at the end of A Charlie Brown Christmas. I really liked SCROOGE but haven't seen it recently.  I have to confess to being awfully fond of LOVE ACTUALLY (especially the lobster in the nativity play). 





It's funny but I used to enjoy all those old cartoon movies with my kids--you know Rudolph, Frosty etc, but the magic has gone. 

LUCY BURDETTE:  My favorite would be SLEEPLESS IN SEATTLE, which I cannot get anyone to watch with me again. Hmmm, that makes me really want to try though...





DEBORAH CROMBIE: LOVE ACTUALLY tops my list as the absolutely-must-see-or-it's-not-Christmas. Yes, I can repeat the dialogue. Yes, I know the soundtrack by heart. And yes, Rhys, I love the lobster in the nativity play. Then A CHRISTMAS STORY, followed by IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE. (My daughter told me yesterday that she's never seen it. How can that be??? Where did I go wrong?? I'm going to fix that!) This year I succumbed to a Hallmark Christmas special, THE CHRISTMAS SHEPHERD, because--guess--it had a German shepherd in it. It was actually pretty good, and the dog was fabulous. I'd watch it again just for him.








And then sometime in the week between Christmas and New Year's, I must watch THE HOLIDAY, with Kate Winslet, Jude Law, Cameron Diaz, and Jack Black. I adore this movie, and not just because I fancy Jude Law. Written and directed by Nancy Meyers, with a score by Hans Zimmer, it has great performances and great dialogue. And it will have you rockin' around the Christmas tree by the end.








JULIA: Debs, I've got to see this now!



HALLIE EPHRON: Adding CHRISTMAS IN CONNECTICUT and THE HOLIDAY to my list... how did I miss them? I've already watched LOVE ACTUALLY, my personal favorite. And queuing up A CHRISTMAS STORY if only to revisit the Red Ryder BB gun and the leg lamp and to listen to that wonderful narrator's voice -- a movie by a radio guy. So why doesn't someone create a leg lamp lawn ornament? I bet it would be a HUGE seller.  

JULIA: Here you go, Hallie:


HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Well, of course, LOVE ACTUALLY. The best. (Just in cases.)  And YOU'VE GOT MAIL.  And I'll watch SEATTLE with you, Lucy!  I never understood THE BISHOPS WIFE, because, I mean, what would you do? 



And contrarian here, A CHRISTMAS STORY leaves me a little cold. Maybe I'll try again. Yeah, the voice is good, but...  And even IT'S A WONDERFUL.., it's great, sure, and the angel thing, but it's just not what someone would DO. Zuzu's petals is worth it, though.  And of course,  love WHITE CHRISTMAS! Can't go wrong with Bing!   And oh, DIE HARD.  :-) 





DEBS: Hank, we watched DIE HARD last year. Such fun!!! Definitely an addition to the Christmas movie list.

JULIA: How about you, dear readers? What will you be sitting down to with a bowl of popcorn and a mug of hot cocoa this season?

CHRISTMAS MUSIC--GRINCH OR ELF?

DEBORAH CROMBIE: 'Tis that time of year once more, where the sound of canned carols rings from every shop and and public space! Grinchy gripes have been popping up on the social ether for the last few weeks-- "Oh, no, not blankity-blank Christmas music again!"

I have to admit some of the canned stuff is pretty awful, and if I worked retail I'd probably be pulling my hair out the next time I heard a synth version of "Santa Claus is Coming to Town."

But I have yet to go in a mall this year, and even on my one foray into Target it was quiet as Christmas midnight. So I've only listened at home, and the truth of it is that I LOVE Christmas music. The CDs and the playlists start right after Thanksgiving and linger into the new year. It's a carryover from childhood for me, I think. My dad loved Christmas music, and loved to sing carols. He wasn't a religious man, so his favorites were the secular songs; White Christmas, Winter Wonderland, and especially Silver Bells. But he could do a mean Silent Night.

Tops on my listening list? Jewel's "Joy: A Holiday Collection." Gorgeous. YoYo Ma's "Songs of Joy and Peace," ditto. A collection called "Stockings by the Fire," and always, always, the soundtrack to "Love Actually."

Oh, and this year's addition? Rod Stewart's "Merry Christmas, Baby." Old gravel voice has mellowed quite nicely, and makes you want to get out that cozy throw and curl up with your hot chocolate.

So where do you fall, REDS? Grinch, or singing elf?

Here's my little Christmas treat to you all.!

Who could resist Ertha Kitt singing "Santa Baby?"

JAN BROGAN: I have a folder of holiday music, and the other night I brought out my guitar to refresh my memory. Since we only play these songs for about a month out of the year, it always takes some refreshing. My favorite is Nat King Cole's "Chestnuts Roasting on an Open FIre," although that's not it's title (which no one ever realizes is the actual song). If I start early enough, I can pull it off, but the arrangement is really complicated jazz chords, so it takes me until Christmas is actually over to play it right.  Last year, I learned  finger pick versions of  Silent Night and Auld Lang Syne, which I kept practicing until March in the hopes it would come back quicker when the season rolled around this year- so we shall see.. I do have a version of Santa Baby somewhere, Debs and you are inspiring me to work on it this year.

RHYS BOWEN: I have favorite CDs that come out as I decorate the house. Mannheim Steamroller, The Choir of King's College Cambridge, a German boys choir. I'm not a big fan of popular Christmas music but Bing Crosby singing White Christmas, Mel Torme singing the Christmas song and anyone singing "I'll be Home for Christmas" can make me tear up. And I have to confess a guilty pleasure. I do love Feliz Navidad! And I do like the music to a Charlie Brown Christmas, especially when they break into Hark the Herald Angels at the end. This year I expect I'll be more weepy than usual...

ROSEMARY HARRIS: I'm a big fan of holiday music and have more Christmas cds than anyone should probably own. Some faves - Bing Crosby and David Bowie singing Little Drummer Boy (also have a great bversion of Marlene Dietrich singing it)Chrissie Hynde Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas, Greg Lake's I Believe in Father Christmas and everything on John Fahey's Christmas albums (acoustic guitar.)

The only one I don't like is this totally morbid song called Christmas Shoes. What a downer. Apparently it was an enormous hit but can't figure out why anyone would want to hear it, particularly at Christmas. Other than that one - bring 'em on!

HALLIE EPHRON: Bar-rup bup bup bum... has always sounded like a rude noise to me. So no, I'm not a huge fan of holiday music. Weirdly I like to sing it but I'm not much on listening to it.

LUCY BURDETTE: Oh Jan, are you going to sing SANTA BABY as well as play? would love to hear that!! Hallie, am working really really hard to block that earworm...

I love singing the hymns during Advent but not hearing repetitive songs in stores. But my favorite of all is listening to the Messiah. We heard a version of it done by the New Haven Symphony orchestra and a New Haven church choir. We were in the third row and it was magical!

HANK PHILLIPPPI RYAN: Can we have the monks withe the placards singing The Hallelujah Chorus It's SO funny! (But okay, I love hearing it even without hte placards.) You're right, Lucy. Magical..and it's impossible not to sing along.

I think Hallie has hit on something--I like singing Christmas music more than I like hearing it...But I love I'll Be Home for Christmas, such a dear song.  And Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas .

I also love Joni Mitchell's River, which really is a Christmas song... and All I Want for Christmas is You, the song in Love Actually. ANd Santa Baby, Definitely. Yup, Feliz Navidad. We spent lots of family Christmases in Mexico, so you can imaagine, that's almost traditional for us! Of truly traditional? O Come Come Emmanuel. And O Come All Ye Faithful.

DEBS: Jan, promise you'll record Santa Baby for us! Ro, I want to hear Chrissie Hynde singing Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. Hank and Rhys, I spent quite a few Christmases in Mexico, too, so have a special fondness for Feliz Navidad. And The River is one of our faves, too.

And after all this, I have "You better watch out, you better not cry," stuck on repeat in my head, so I'm going to give us one more to get a little Christmas spirit going, All I Want for Christmas, from Love Actually.

So what about you, readers? Are you singing along?

FAVORITE CHRISTMAS MOVIES

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Hooray, it's the Jungle Red Saturday List, and now that Thanksgiving is over, we are of course thinking about Christmas. But just to take the sting out of all the hoopla of shopping, wrapping, mailing, decorating, and sending cards, I thought we should turn our minds to pure, unadulterated pleasure--Christmas movies. I love Christmas movies, unabashedly, and would happily watch them non-stop for a month if I could find the time.

I meant to say limit your choice to one movie, but since I'm going to cheat and put in two, everyone else can, too.

Oh, so many to choose from! But my very close second spot goes to LOVE ACTUALLY, which I will undoubtedly make my husband watch at least once, and he will complain that it's incredibly sappy but watch it anyway, bless him.

#1, however, must go to A Christmas Story. Although this movie debuted in 1983, I didn't see it until my husband introduced me to it in the mid-nineties, and I've been in love with it ever since. It is a writer's movie if ever there was one, adapted from Jean Shepherd's story, "Red Ryder Nails the Hammond Kid," first published in the December, 1965, issue of Playboy Magazine. (How many of you knew that?) Wonderful performances from Darren McGavin, Melinda Dillon, and Peter Billingsly as "Ralphie." (Peter Billingsly, by the way, grew up to be quite dishy. Recognize him without the glasses?)

So, Reds, what are YOUR faves?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: LOVE, ACTUALLY, is my favorite. Absolutely. NO question, no second thoughts. I play the album all the time--and people say, isn't that a Christmas movie? And I don't care. Second? Ah...I'm stumped. I do like It's a Wonderful Life, especially the dancing on the swimming pool,but --shrugging. Sometimes I think it's creepy. (What can I say? He was going to kill himself, and leave his whole family?) You've Got Mail? How about that? But I don't like the ending.

JAN BROGAN: Miracle on 34th Street, hands down. What better fantasy than one of those shopping mall Santas is the real guy. And it's got to be the version with Natalie Wood as the little girl. Although I am a big fan of A Christmas Story, I still think my second place goes to It's A Wonderful Life - even if I groan a little at the length of it.

RHYS BOWEN: I have so many favorites, including "You'll shoot your eye out!" but every year I don't feel Christmassy until I watch WHITE CHRISTMAS and IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE. (And I also love Scrooge, but that would be cheating to slip another one in, wouldn't it :)

ROSEMARY HARRIS: So mean to make us stick to just two! I love all of the movies mentioned - Albert Finney as Scrooge, so brilliant.(But so was Bill Murray.)
Okay...stop cheating.)

A Christmas Carol - must be the Alistair Sim version and Love Actually. I will probably watch that twice between now and New Year's. "I feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes....."

DEBS: Hank and Rosemary, I LOVE the soundtrack to Love Actually. It's stayed at the top of my playlist for years. I wonder what ever happened to that darling girl singer?

ROSEMARY: I had googled her a while ago! Her name is Olivia Olson and she's still singing and still cute as a button. Here's a link to her version of All I Want from Love Actually: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0H_WKfRDA8w

HALLIE EPHRON: You've named all my favorites! Top of the list, I agree with you, Debs: A Christmas Story. Testament to its staying power: I saw in one of the store ads (K-Mart? Target?) that sexy leg and tassel lamp the father lusts after.

For a little less treacle, I like Home for the Holidays. Holly Hunter has to spend the holidays with her family, where she so does NOT want to be. Brilliant turn by Robert Downey Jr. Plus Ernst Lubitsch's The Shop Around the Corner (Margaret Sullavan and James Stewart at their most vulnerable) - watch it back to back with its adaptation You've Got Mail.

LUCY BURDETTE: Sleepless in Seattle, not completely Christmas but the holiday's in there. Going to watch Love Actually again, along with A Christmas Story and Home for the Holidays. thanks for the suggestions!

JAN: Lucy, I think you just cheated :) Watch out for coal in your stocking from my Macy's Santa.

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I must be the oldies fan in the bunch. Two of my favorites are Christmas in Connecticut (1945) and White Christmas (1954.) The first one has the stunningly fashionable Barbara Stanwick who does what we'd call lifestyle blogging today. Except she's a complete fake who lives in a West Side apartment and who can't cook. Caught out by her publisher's offer to host a wounded vet, she has to scramble to recreate her "perfect" rural lifestyle - complete with husband and baby!

Everyone knows the second. How can you go wrong with Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye and Vera Lynne and the incomparable Rosemary Harris, all harmonizing on "Snow" as they take the train up to Vermont? It has all the hallmarks of the 1950's musical - songs that make no sense, silly romantic mix-ups, and a stage in a barn that's larger than Lincoln Center. I love it.

DEBS: Okay, I'm cheating--how could I have forgotten The Holiday? I love that one, and would watch it over and over just to see Eli Wallach.

I'm putting Home for the Holidays on my to-watch list, and some of the ones I haven't seen in years, like Christmas in Connecticut and White Christmas.

Sounds like a great alternative to shopping!

So, what about you, readers? No cheating--well, maybe a little... Tell us your faves!

Love Actually - All I Want For Christmas Is You

Happy Holidays!!! (just click on the link to Youtube and/or the small pix underneath)

Ho, ho, ho....

Hopefully we've gotten you into the holiday spirit with recipes, gift ideas and most important - book buying recommendations.

What keeps you in the holiday mood? For me, it's holiday movies ...and baking.

Two years ago, I was too lazy to move all the furniture in my living room and decided to put my Christmas tree in my kitchen. It was a brilliant move.

I should probably explain that my house has an open floor plan so I can still see the tree from the living area, but it's changed everything (and I can get a taller tree.) I've also started collecting ornaments that are cooking or baking related - got three charming tea cup ornaments last year and a set of snowmen chefs.

Anyway..while I'm in the kitchen admiring my tree and baking I require even more visual stimulation. Rolling dough can be zenlike, but it can also be a tad boring. That's where the movies come in.

So this year's must-watch holiday films, which are very much like last year's are -

The Snowman - adore this book, this film AND the music.

A Christmas Carol (Alastair Sim version) - the quintessential Scrooge

Scrooged (Bill Murray) - "can't we staple the antlers to the mouse's head?"

Scrooge (Albert Finney) -esp., the rousing "Thank You Very Much" number

The Bishop's Wife - it's Cary Grant, what's not to like?

Falling in Love - I was so pleased to see Sandra Brown - on the S&S website - say this was one of her favorite holiday movies. Me too. And I love the Dave Grusin music. And last but not least

..Love Actually. Can you ever see that movie too many times??? Not me. I may actually be wearing out my dvd.

So, on the outside chance that I haven't already named them, what are your favorite holiday movies?

JAN: Miracle on 34th Street, with the young Natalie Wood, is the only holiday movie I can watch over and over again. I like Its a Wonderful Life, but I've maxed out on it.

RO: It's a Wonderful Life used to be a must-see for me. I started a public domain video line in the 80's and that was far and away our biggest seller. I've seen it dozens of times so I've taken a break too. "Sentimental hogwash!" but we love it. It will eventually work its way back into the rotation.

Re MOTFS - I was in Macy's this week on a wooden escalator so old I kept thinking I was going to see Maureen O'Hara or Edmund Gwenn somewhere.

HALLIE: I'll happily spend another hour and a half with Ralphie in "A Christmas Story" (surely Malcolm in the Middle was smoking this)

Ralphie: I want an official Red Ryder, carbine action, two-hundred shot range model air rifle!

Mrs. Parker: No, you'll shoot your eye out

And if we're talking radio, I love listening to David Sedaris's "Santa's Little Helper" (diary of an elf at Macy's department store)

RO: How could I forget A Christmas Story??? Frrra-geeee-laaaayyy!

HANK: Love, Actually. NO question. I burst into tears thinking about it. I play the CD all year. I think about it every time I'm at the airport. It's just so--personal.

RO: I'm with Hank. If you are too, come back on Saturday for a Love Actually treat!