Juan Monroy

There are favorites, no doubt: Elf, Scrooged, A Christmas Story, and It’s a Wonderful Life. But it’s not easy to remember that the following films were Christmas movies, even if they weren’t Christmas movies..

1. Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang probably because it was a neo-noir set in Los Angeles, where balmy temperatures belie what is supposed to Christmas in movies.
2. The Ref probably because the hostage situation and really dark comedy lack the usual warmth of Christmas.
3. Eyes Wide Shut probably because it was Kubrick’s final film and the chilling masquerade party scene is anything but…

By the way, the latter is playing this week at IFC Center, in Greenwich Village, until Thursday, as part of their Naughty and Nice film series.

Not quite two years ago, Time ran a listicle about such movies that I found while researching this post, which reminded me about Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang and lists other not-Christmas, Christmas films.

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