Watching Hollywood movies on tv has turned into a stalking expedition for Schwartz. Having discovered a while ago that most movies contain gratuitous allusions to Christmas, he has been calling Bingo!, hitting pause and taking pictures of the frames where Christmas shows its spots.
This is not about the late December staples like It’s a wonderful life (1946) and Home alone (1990), or the new contender Red one (2024), three of the hundreds of movies that have made it onto the Wikipedia list of Christmas films. It’s not even about Die hard (1988) and other action films with an outspoken Christmas theme. (Although it is worth pondering how the Incarnation, culminating in God’s bloody self-sacrifice, devolved into saccharine entertainment fare.) No, this is about all the other Hollywood movies. Some time ago I began to notice that Christmas manages to find its way into half of them or more. Films that have nothing to do with Baby Jesus or a plot demanding linkage with the holiday. To document this discovery, I have begun to pause films on tv and take a photo of the evidence. What follows is minimal evidence of a maximal phenomenon.
Exploiting Christmas may have different meanings to the various directors, but a possible tipoff for most was heedlessly revealed in Three days to kill. The plot is a big yawn – a hit man who has been a criminally neglectful parent wants to make up with his daughter. We’ve seen Donald Sutherland try, and Bruce Willis, Gene Hackman, Johnny Depp, Nick Nolte, whoever. Probably has something to do with bad consciences in the studio. Anyway, in Three days to kill Kevin Costner murders a lot more people than he was paid to, in the midst of doing which he nonetheless picks up his cell phone whenever his daughter Zooey (Hailee Steinfeld) rings, making dates with her that conflict with his contract. I’m afraid I have to agree with the critic Mark Kermode, who in The Guardian called the movie “pitiful.” The clue that interests me is tagged on to the end. When Zooey, after reels of pouting recalcitrance, does warm up to Daddy, the mother and ex-wife (Connie Nielsen) asks him how he did it, and he says, “With one word.” You know what the word is. Out of nowhere, there is Kevin, Christmasing it up.
One word. Say or show Christmas and you have pushed a moviegoer’s button, releasing in the hearts and minds of the audience a goody-goody subconscious surge that wipes out everything that may be wrong with the movie. What could be wrong with a movie that loves Christmas? Without you knowing it, your id has put you back in line at F.A.O. Schwarz, being desperately good while waiting to sit on Santa Claus’s lap. The directors don’t have to think about it in these terms. They too are infected with Christmas meshugaas.
I gladly relinquish this theory in favor of a better one. Having awoken you to the existence of creeping Christmasism in the movies, you will be seeing it too, and you may come up with a better explanation than mine. The comments counter below is open. So is the donations button, in service of the Christmas spirit…
© 2024 Gary Schwartz. Published on the Schwartzlist on 19 December 2024.
See the bonus column from 1996, Schwartzlist 5: The Dutchness of Neapolitan art.
Despite all – I won’t fill in what that all is – Loekie and I are enjoying life, sharing love with family and friends, and wishing you the same.
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I try not to notice Christmas. It’s not in my tradition. Its tawdry quality is ugly and mindless, but then so much in American culture is ugly and mindless. Everything seems to be commercialized. Perhaps we in the USA use features of capitalism to dull our senses to poverty, racism, and jingoism. Genocide is being perpetuated every day by Israel and, like viewing death and destruction in Viet Nam fifty-five years ago, to many of us simply change the channel or celebrate a holiday.
You’ve got to ease off once in a while if you want to live in this world, Stan, no?
Or, Gary, watch worthwhile presentations on TV like my husband and I watched last night (20 December) on Netflix, entitled “The Six Triple Eight” where a group of remarkable African American Women got mail out in ninety days to families of soldiers which were horded up by the army (75 million pieces of mail) during WWII.
Dear Eva,
A number of offline responses have also cast polite aspersions on my taste in movies. For better or (mainly) worse, it was formed by 1940s Saturday afternoon double features at Loew’s Warwick, which cinematreasures.org tells me was closed in 1954 and demolished in 1958, after we had moved from East New York to Far Rockaway. (My parents kindly looked the other way when I joined a bunch of friends on those transgressional Sabbath afternoons.)
Thanks for the tip, I’ll see whether Netflix is airing “The Six Triple Eight” here. But you’ll be surprised at how many art house films also exploit the Incarnation.
Be well, Gary
Thank you Gary! Your are enlightening. Happy Holidays! I hope “The Six Triple Eight” will find its way to the Netherlands in your edition of NETFLIX. Eva
Thanks for easing off, Gary. For noticing, observing, documenting, and chronicling those peculiarities that escape us lowly humanoids! One may not be into Xmas, but the realization that it pops up across the celluloid universe engenders the kind of merriment that we desperately crave today.
Right on, Arjaan! Christmas hunting adds spice to moviewatching and gives me a kick when that Santa Claus or Christmas tree turns up for no reason at all. Ciao, Gary