The best classic Christmas movies of all time
Have yourself a vintage little Christmas.
When it comes to Christmas movies, contemporary flicks like Elf and Love Actually may immediately spring to mind. But, if you really want to embody holiday cheer, nothing beats an old-school, classic Christmas movie.
Something about the charm of Old Hollywood stars combined with a nostalgic soundtrack immediately creates a cosy and enchanting holiday environment—perfect for settling into the colder nights with a piping hot cup of tea. Be serenaded by Bing Crosby and Ingrid Bergman in The Bells of St. Mary’s or get sucked into the past with James Stewart and Donna Reed in It‘s a Wonderful Life. No matter which movie you decide to turn on, the following 47 options are proof that the true magic of Christmas transcends time.
If you’re in the mood for more films to round out your December watch list, then look no further—here are our picks for the funniest Christmas movies, the best Christmas movies on Netflix, and the general best winter films of all time.
Beyond Tomorrow
In this little-remembered 1940 romance, Jean Parker and Richard Carlson play Jean, a teacher, and James, a cowboy. The strangers get invited to spend the evening with a trio of wealthy but lonely engineers. Jean and James hit it off, but the next day the engineers are tragically killed in a plane crash. But, even death won’t stop those three from making sure that Jean and James get their happy ending. As ghosts, the trio work together to ensure that the teacher and cowboy’s romance succeeds.
Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town
This enchanting 1970 stop-motion film tells the backstory of Santa Claus. An orphaned baby is taken in by the Kringles, an elf family in the business of toy making. They name the infant Kris and raise him up to be one of them. When Kris grows up, he’s determined to deliver toys to the children of Sombertown, even though the village’s grumpy mayor prohibits toys.
3 Godfathers
In this 1948 retelling of the biblical story of the Three Wise Men, John Wayne, Pedro Armendáriz, and Harry Carey Jr. play three cowboys who happen upon a pregnant woman in the middle of a desert sandstorm. They aid the woman as she gives birth to a baby boy. Before she dies, she anoints the men as her son’s godfathers and makes them promise to watch over him after she passes.
It’s a Wonderful Life
Better in color or no? That’s the only legit debate when it comes to Frank Capra’s classic, now a must-watch for the holiday season. It’s just too difficult to argue against five Oscars, an indelible message, James Stewart, and that amazing pool scene.
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Francie Nolan is growing up in Brooklyn in the 1900s, and though her family is struggling with the clutches of poverty and alcoholism, she is determined to make it out of her Brooklyn apartment—just like the single tree persevering outside her window. An adaptation of the classic novel, this one features a holiday scene so touching, it just might rival the Cratchits’ Christmas.
Since You Went Away
An all-star cast including Claudette Colbert, Jennifer Jones, and Shirley Temple team up for a familial drama about a wife who holds down the fort while her husband is away at war. Though this one isn't necessarily festive from start to finish, it does air on movie channels around the holidays due to its moving Christmas scene.
The Bells of St. Mary's
Starring Bing Crosby and Ingrid Bergman, this 1945 gem sees a priest and a nun butt heads before joining forces to save a big-city Catholic school with a new building around the holidays. It's a timeless tale that is elevated with tunes from Crosby, a charming performance from Bergman, and themes of faith, hope, and the spirit of community.
Bachelor Mother
Ginger Rogers spins through the unexpected follies of motherhood after agreeing to care for an orphan baby she "got for Christmas" in exchange for a job. If the synopsis sounds a little bit dated, it's because this Garson Kanin classic premiered way back in 1939. But don't worry: The comedy, the romance, and the razzle-dazzle are all timeless.
Penny Serenade
Irene Dunne and Cary Grant star as a married couple on the brink of divorce in this holiday-themed drama from George Stevens. After suffering a series tragedies, the two find their connection dwindling and struggle to find the love they once knew. Fair warning: This one is definitely a tissue movie, so keep that decorative box nearby while watching.
Scrooge
Also titled simply A Christmas Carol, this 1951 drama from Brian Desmond Hurst stars one of the best Ebenezer Scrooges in Alastair Sim to ever embody the role. Of course, it's based on the Charles Dickens's novella you know and love, and it joins a massive collection of Carol remakes, reimaginings, and retellings, but somehow, this version stands as a beacon of holiday compassion.
The Cheaters
Highly acclaimed yet lesser known, The Cheaters unravels around the daughter of a wealthy New York City family who brings a down-and-out former actor home for the holidays. Turns out, the family isn't doing so well either. On the verge of bankruptcy and plotting to steal an inheritance, the group spend Christmas all wrapped up in a comedy of errors.
The Sound of Music
Another one that isn't necessarily a Christmas movie, but is definitely the makings of a holiday tradition, The Sound of Music is tiptop Julie Andrews fare with a German accent. As the governess of a family with eight children, Andrews's Maria sings, chimes, and rhymes her way through the trials and tribulations of the Von Trapp family in the 1930s.
We're No Angels
One Christmas, three inmates escape from Devil's Island prison and hunker down with a kind family who take them in. Seeing that the fam isn’t doing so well, the trio (led by Humphrey Bogart) offer their charms in different ways to keep them afloat. Touted as the “three wise guys” in the movie trailer, this thieving trio will steal every heart in the room.
A Christmas Carol
Deciding which adaptation of Charles Dickens’s tale is your favorite is an entirely personal journey. For us, one is Edwin Marin’s family-friendly version of Scrooge and his ghost squad. Made during the Golden Age of Hollywood, it’s light on yuletide fear, heavy on Christmas cheer, and we’re okay with that.
Miracle on 34th Street
Winner of three Oscars, George Seaton’s Big Apple miracle, about Santa having to prove in a court of law he is actually Santa, was released on May 2, 1947—and has been played on a yearly loop ever since. Fun fact: Natalie Wood, who played nonbeliever Susan, was still a believer during filming.
A Dream for Christmas
Produced in the ‘70s but set in the ‘50s, A Dream for Christmas is a hallmark of classic Black holiday films. Starring Hari Rhodes, Beah Richards, and Lynn Hamilton, the movie follows a hardworking Southern minister who relocates his family to the West Coast to save a church. According to TCM, it was the extended pilot episode of what was supposed to be the next Waltons series.
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
Technically a TV special that could never have known its 50+-year endurance, Rudolph plus Frosty and their companion holiday classics count as a feature-length affair in our book. Plus, what’s a holiday viewing roundup without a stop-motion tale narrated by Burl Ives?
A Charlie Brown Christmas
Not sure there’s a better fireside counterpart than chestnuts – except for Peanuts. And West Coast jazz. Both of which make Charles Schulz’s A Charlie Brown Christmas a holiday classic that’s as wonderful and modest as a certain top-heavy hero’s Christmas tree.
Babes in Toyland
This whimsical Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy classic, also known by its reissue title, March of the Wooden Soldiers, isn’t so much a Christmas movie in the traditional sense—but it is set in a child’s dreamland, and a certain jelly-bellied man in red indeed makes an appearance. That said, the storybook plot, charming interludes, and nutty comedic stylings make for an ideal festive watch for the entire family.
The Holly and the Ivy
A family gathering to celebrate the Christmas holiday are surprised when an unexpected member of the family shows up: the patriarch who’s given his loved ones the cold shoulder. It’s a heartwarming English tale that doesn’t skimp on all essentials that make up a holiday film: shots of heavy snowfall, close-ups of crackling fires, and endless notes of Christmas carols.
Meet Me in St. Louis
Judy Garland stars as daughter Esther Smith in this Technicolor musical about a family preparing for a permanent move to New York. The story covers the entire year before their relocating, so Christmas is only a small part, but the sorrowful rendition of Garland singing “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” is enough to land it a place on our list. Plus, the film is featured in another holiday fave: The Family Stone.
Bundle of Joy
Eddie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds take the lead in this delightful (albeit way outdated) musical about a department store clerk, the baby she finds at an orphanage, and the pickle her little one gets her into. Of course, there’s plenty of romance, show tunes, and dance numbers on the menu, but the real dish is beholding the chemistry between Reynolds and her real-life husband at the time, Mr. Fisher.
Christmas Lilies of the Field
There is no Sidney Poitier, but this small-screen follow-up to the 1963 hallmark film Lilies of the Field still holds its own. Starring Billy Dee Williams as Homer, the film is a gift that keeps on giving decades later. When Homer returns to the chapel he helped build years earlier, he sees that the nuns have opened their doors to homeless children. Moved, he rolls up his sleeves and gets to work on a school and orphanage. Hearts will be filled.
Desk Set
Your annual office Christmas party has nothing on the romp on display in this Walter Lang classic. Stream-able in Technicolor that makes the jewel-toned palette suited to the season pop off the screen, the film stars Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn as a pair of polar opposites at odds with the future of their network. Most of the film takes place at their Manhattan office place (the very famous 30 Rock, to be exact), and the iconic Rockefeller tree even makes a cameo.
I’ll Be Seeing You
Shirley Temple and the holidays are as synonymous as ginger ale and grenadine. Not a year goes by that we don’t see the curly-topped actress on the small screen singing something sweet and cheery. Here, however, she’s all grown up and starring opposite Ginger Rogers and Joseph Cotten in a David O. Selznick production about secrets, drama, and romance. Just what the holidays call for.
The Lemon Drop Kid
You know that classic carol “Silver Bells”? It was actually introduced in this crime comedy, and sung by Bob Hope and Marilyn Maxwell. That’s reason alone to queue up the classic, but should you want to know more before committing, well, Hope plays Sidney Milburn, a racetrack scammer who has until Christmas to pay back the mob. Slapstick, sing-alongs, sour candy: What more could you want?
The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek
Screwball comedies of the ‘40s are a cause for celebration—and this diamond in the snow is proof. A twist on the holiday’s nativity story, the fun begins with a night of revelry at a sendoff party for American troops, and ends with a woman waking up to find herself married, pregnant, and with no memory of who the soldier boy is. (It sounds more scandalous than it actually is.)
The Apartment
A comedy of complicated love connections, Billy Wilder’s rom-com is about a man who allows his bosses to use his digs for trysts with their mistresses as an attempt to climb the corporate ladder. And though Christmas is more of a choice of setting than a driving plotline, the brilliant dialogue between its stars—Shirley MacLaine and Jack Lemmon—is the very same magic that so often is celebrated this time of year.
Meet John Doe
You can’t do Christmas without Frank Capra, but there is more to his seasonal classic vault than his holiday stalwart starring Jimmy Stewart, It’s a Wonderful Life. Five years before George Bailey was dangling off a bridge, a man known only as John Doe was threatening to jump off City Hall on Christmas Eve. It’s a ploy designed to save the job of a journalist, played by Barbara Stanwyck, but it ends up igniting a populist movement and culminating in one of the prettiest, snowiest denouements on film.
The Thin Man
Before young Ralphie was shooting his eye out, Nick Charles was popping off rounds on Christmas morning with his new air-rifle in a crime comedy about a retired detective, his wife, and the case they attempt to solve while soaking their banter in shaken dry martinis.
White Christmas
Though some would argue White Christmas’s snowy lookalike, Holiday Inn—the other Bing Crosby-and-Irving Berlin collaboration—deserves mention (it did come to life first, after all), it’s the former, starring Crosby and Danny Kaye, we simply can’t not watch. Blessings = counted.
Remember the Night
Another Christmas-in-the-courtroom classic worth warming your heart? Mitchell Leisen’s black-and-white rom-com that unfolds in session—or rather, during court recess over Christmas. That’s when district attorney John Sargent falls in love with the shoplifter he’s prosecuting.
Christmas in Connecticut
There is no holly without jolly. And there is no Christmas without cookies. Bake up a batch and settle in for this comedy about a writer whose cover as a Susie Homemaker with Dominique Crenn-worthy oven skills is about to get blown over a holiday in the Northeast. Now, just add milk.
The Shop Around the Corner
A pair of gift shop salespeople who despise each other anonymously fall in love via their pen-pal correspondence. Sound familiar? It should. James Stewart and Margaret Sullavan’s onscreen tale is the inspiration for Nora Ephron's classic You’ve Got Mail.
The Bishop’s Wife
Two of the five Oscar nominees in 1948 were holiday films: this one, and a certain miracle that happened in midtown Manhattan. Here, Henry Koster directs a tale about an angel with quite the to-do list: help a bishop, build a church, save a marriage. Sounds a lot like a job for Denzel.
It Happened on Fifth Avenue
The Fifth Avenue you know, but the “it” you may not. It refers to the Christmas when Trudy, the daughter of the second-richest man in the world, arrives home early to find drifters and NYC’s homeless residing in her family’s townhouse. Love and merrymaking, right this way.
Holiday Affair
Don Hartman’s rom-com forgoes the saccharine sentimentality Hallmark brings for the holidays (not that there's anything wrong with that), though seasonal sentiment is not all lost among a widow, two men, and partridge in a pear tree.
How the Grinch Stole Christmas
If you've found yourself with a frigid heart this holiday season, then a cranky green monster who discards his hate for Christmas is just what Dr. Seuss ordered. Fun fact: Seuss’s Grinch was black and white with pink eyes. Chuck Jones made him green for the screen.
Bell, Book and Candle
Old Hollywood starlet Kim Novak takes the lead in this enchanting romantic comedy that uses December’s big day as its backdrop. As a shop girl with supernatural abilities, she casts a love spell on her neighbor (Jimmy Stewart) because she despises his fiancée. Of course, she never expected to fall in love with him herself.
Christmas Holiday
Craving a little film noir with your spiked eggnog? Look no further than this 1944 crime drama starring Deanna Durbin and Gene Kelly. Playing against type (sorry, no endurance dance numbers here), Kelly becomes Robert Manette, a crook with a killer secret, while Durbin takes on the role of his wife, Abigail. It’s a tale that unfolds over December 25 in New Orleans, but know: No one has a merry Christmas here.
Plácido
A Spanish comedy classic, Luis García Berlanga’s 1961 film mingles with the wealthy inhabitants of a tiny town who have each decided to invite someone of lesser fortune to their Christmas Eve tables to share a meal. Chaotic and gloriously topsy-turvy, the narrative revolves around one guest in particular, the titular Plácido, a homeless man who drives a three-wheel motorbike.
The Wiz
Another film that airs annually around the holidays, The Wiz is an offshoot of The Wizard of Oz and stars an all-Black cast. And though its technical designation is “fantasy film,” the charm and allure of Sidney Lumet’s 1978 classic has solidified it as a celebrated holiday event for families across the country. A cast including the legendary Diana Ross, Lena Horne, and Mabel King will do that.
The Man Who Came to Dinner
Starring Monty Woolley and Bette Davis, The Man Who Came to Dinner is a screwball comedy that hopped from Broadway to the big screen. As Sheridan Whiteside, an acerbic Scrooge who intrudes on an Ohio family for Christmas, Woolley is utter humbug perfection. Plus, the film has penguins, plotting, and piety aplenty. Just what the holiday ordered.
Holiday Inn
There's nothing quite like a love triangle for the holidays! In this 1954 classic, Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire serenade their various love interests and the film's soundtrack is one that's not to be missed. The holiday tune "White Christmas" was composed specifically for the film and ended up later inspiring a film of its own (also starring Crosby).
My Night at Maud’s
Fans of Stanley Kubrick’s off-brand holiday odyssey, Eyes Wide Shut, will appreciate Éric Rohmer’s French philosophical tale. ’Twas the night before Christmas and devout Catholic Jean-Louis found himself stranded with a sensuous divorcée named Maud—his faith, morals, and rigid standards meeting their greatest match.
Lead image: IMDb
