| Marisa LaScala |
Elf (2003)
If you have kids, it’ll be a while before you can watch Old School or Anchorman with the family, but Elf has a Will Ferrell performance that’s just as funny and also good for that multi-generational movie night. He’s the perfect fish-out-of-water in this comedy — only he’s an elf trying to spread joy on the mean streets of New York City.
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Genie (2023)
Usually, it’s Santa who comes and saves the day around the holidays, but in this movie it’s a genie in the form of the always funny Melissa McCarthy. She’s released by a man whose life is crumbling around him, and together they have to put the pieces back together again (and maybe find some friendship along the way). It’s written by Richard Curtis, who made Love, Actually.
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (1989)
This movie is instant catharsis for anyone whose holidays with the family turn into chaos. Watching it is a balm, and will make your family the jolliest bunch of a-holes this side of the nuthouse.
Candy Cane Lane (2023)
An Amazon Original you can watch with the family, this feature Eddie Murphy doing what he’s great at: playing a dad who is in over his head. This time, he plays someone who, in order to win his neighborhood Christmas decoration, makes a deal with an elf that brings the 12 Days of Christmas to life, causing mayhem
Metropolitan (1990)
If you like your comedy to be witty and verbose rather than full of slapstick gags, there’s no better than Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan. This film follows a group of young socialites who get together and gab throughout the holiday debutante season.
The Night Before (2015)
Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Seth Rogen and Anthony Mackie star as three childhood friends who take part in their annual Christmas Eve celebration, and then get swept up in mayhem as they try to find a rumored underground party. And while the R-rated hijinx they get into is increasingly insane, it’s also nice to see a movie about adults who actually enjoy celebrating the holidays together, as opposed to most movies that show adults doing it out of some kind of obligation.
It Happened on Fifth Avenue (1947)
In this charmer of a movie, the comedy starts when a hobo decides to pose as a rich man and squat in a Fifth Avenue mansion while the true owner is in Virginia for the winter, and he invites a down-on-his-luck friend to do the same. Gradually, more and people move in — including the owner’s runway daughter, and, eventually, the owner himself posing as another squatter — until there’s so many cases of mistaken identity it’s hard to keep track of who’s who. And, of course, a romance blossoms in the midst of all the chaos.
Bad Santa (2003)
The year 2003 was a banner one for Christmas comedies: It brought us one of the sweetest ones with Elf — and also one of the dirtiest ones with Bad Santa. In it, Billy Bob Thornton plays a foul-mouthed mall Santa who’s secretly planning a Christmas heist but winds up bonding with a local kid and developing some holiday spirit in spite of himself. (And, if you enjoy it, there is a sequel.)
The Nice Guys (2016)
This is for those who are trying to sneak a Christmas movie past a reluctant holiday-movie watcher, since it’s mostly a mystery set against the backdrop of Christmas. In it, Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling play two men trying to track down a missing woman, and their odd-couple energy brings plenty of laughs.
A Christmas Story (1983)
A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas (2011)
The Best Man Holiday (2013)
The many-years-later sequel to The Best Man, this ensemble movie is equal parts broad comedy and weepy melodrama, so only throw it on if you really want to feel the full spectrum of emotions. It follows a group of college friends who reunite for the holidays, stirring up lots of old-friend group dynamics.
Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001)
Bridget Jones’s Diary is not strictly a Christmas movie — though you would never guess from Mark Darcy’s famed Rudolph sweater (which he actually wears to a New Year’s party). Taking place over the course of the year, it is bookended by holiday seasons and has plenty of snow, merriment and aforementioned ugly sweaters to feel at home in a Christmas movie marathon. Throughout that year, Bridget takes stock of her life and haplessly finds herself in situations that feel like Pride and Prejudice if it were written for laughs.
The Apartment (1960)
Billy Wilder’s Best Picture-winning film is screwball, romance, drama and holiday merriment all rolled into one. It centers on the lowly Bud Baxter (Jack Lemmon), who learns he can climb the corporate ladder if he lends his New York City bachelor pad out to the executives so they can carry on their extramarital affairs. Keeping it all straight — including who is using the apartment when — sets all sorts of antics into motion, and complicates things for Bud’s own love life, which comes to a head at an office Christmas party.
Almost Christmas (2016)
It’s paraphrasing Tolstoy to say that all happy families are the same, and all unhappy families are good fodder for Christmas movies. In this one, Danny Glover plays a recent widower who invites his grown children home for the holidays, where drama ensues.
Trading Places (1983)
Though it’s not about gathering around the tree, this Prince-and-the-Pauper-style comedy does take place at Christmastime, and says something about the generosity of the human spirit (or lack thereof). Plus, it has Dan Aykroyd in one of the dirtiest Santa suits ever put to film.
A Bad Moms Christmas (2017)
The three moms from Bad Moms, played by Kathryn Hahn, Mila Kunis and Kristen Bell, have to deal with a huge obstacle to their own Christmas cheer — their own mothers. Add on the pressure to make holidays magical, and you’ve got a comedy that really gets any stressed-out parent.
Scrooged (1988)
So many actors have taken on the role of an Ebenezer Scrooge-type figure, from Alastair Sims to Scrooge McDuck, but, in Bill Murray’s hands, the shopworn stereotype of a Christmas crank becomes a figure of hilarity. It just goes to show that if you mix Murray and ghosts, the result is always funny.
Boxing Day (2021)
This sweet film has garnered comparisons to another British import — Love, Actually — and not just because it also has a placard scene. It’s because the story, about a Brit living in America who brings his girlfriend to London to meet his can-be-a-bit-much Caribbean family, is equal parts big-hearted romance and meet-the-fam comedy.
Marisa (she/her) has covered all things parenting, from the postpartum period through the empty nest, for Good Housekeeping since 2018; she previously wrote about parents and families at Parents and Working Mother. She lives with her husband and daughter in Brooklyn, where she can be found dominating the audio round at her local bar trivia night or tweeting about movies.
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