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Dec. 23, 2024 - The Matt Walsh Show
11:26
Matt Walsh Reviews CHRISTMAS MOVIES

Matt Walsh lists the best, and worst, Christmas movies of all time. Today's Sponsor: The Wellness Company - Exclusive Discount for my Listeners. Use promo code WALSH at https://www.UrgentCareKit.com/WALSH

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All right, we have some more content for you today.
It's important that we keep churning out content.
If you go a day without content, then the world will explode.
Merry Christmas, you filthy animal!
That's what I've been told anyway.
So anyway, so today we're going to talk about Christmas movies.
You may have noticed that it's December, which is why we've chosen this very topical subject.
I don't know what to say except it's Christmas and we're all in misery.
Specifically, what I'd like to do is pass down from on high the official list of the top two Christmas movies.
There are only two.
And then because this wouldn't be a Matt Walsh video without complaining about something, I'm also going to officially declare which Christmas movies are the most overrated.
So we're going to do, you know, positive and negative, both ends of the spectrum.
Let's begin with the top Christmas movies.
And there's one important stipulation here, this is very important.
Charlie Brown's Christmas, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the cartoon, and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer are all delightful.
I watch them with my kids every year.
They're great.
They're not feature-length films, so they're disqualified from consideration.
If we're doing a video about the best Christmas TV episodes or short films, it would have only three titles on it, and it would be the three I just mentioned.
But that's not the video we're doing here.
As for great Christmas films, there have been two.
Only two.
Tis the season to be merry.
There have also been some decent Christmas movies.
There have been some good ones.
There have been some passable ones.
But the two great ones are these.
And we'll go down the list, starting at two.
Number two, The Christmas Story.
You'll shoot your eye out, kid.
Now, there are some people who argue that A Christmas Story is overrated.
And those people are Philistines and scoundrels.
A Christmas Story is a movie that I've seen probably 30 times in my life, if not more.
I enjoy it every time.
No movie has ever captured the magic and wonder of Christmas as a child.
Like A Christmas Story does.
It's a timeless film in that every generation of children can watch it and relate to Ralphie and his quest for the Red Ryder BB gun, just as every generation of adult can watch the movie and feel nostalgic even though we didn't grow up in the 50s.
Tragile!
It must be Italian!
It is in many ways a perfect film.
There isn't any change that I would make to any of the performances, the script, everything about it.
The movie perfectly accomplishes what it wants to do.
A movie like The Princess Bride is in a similar boat.
These are perfect films.
They're perfect.
Not top 10 or top 20 films ever made, but they're still perfect.
They're perfect at doing the thing that they're trying to do.
There's a shortage of perfect films in this world.
It would be a pity to damage yours.
And one thing I love about the movie, and something that modern Christmas movies and modern movies in general, I think, get wrong, is that The stakes in the story of a Christmas movie, the stakes remain very personal and very contained.
Now, in modern Christmas movies, and I've seen a lot of those too with my kids, unfortunately, like every single one, there's always the thing at the end where somebody has to rescue Santa or whatever from somewhere or something because if they don't, you know, there will be no Christmas for anyone ever again.
It becomes this, like, global thing.
A Christmas story doesn't do that.
The story remains intimate and personal.
The stakes are that the kid wants a BB gun.
That's it.
It never becomes a planetary crisis.
And for that reason, the movie feels nostalgic and charming and relatable.
It feels like Christmas in a way that many modern Christmas films don't.
Okay, so that's number two.
Number one, the top Christmas movie of all time, hands down, no contest, not a competition, is It's a Wonderful Life.
Now this is, in fact, one of the greatest films ever made.
Not just Christmas film, but films in general.
It's one of the all-time, probably top 15 films ever made.
It is iconic.
It is perfect.
Again, there's not one beat or frame or moment or performance or anything that I would change.
What is it you want, Barry?
What do you want?
You want the moon?
Just say the word and I'll throw a lasso around it and pull it down.
It cannot be topped.
It cannot be remade.
If anybody ever tries to remake it, they should be boiled alive in hot oil and then buried in the desert in an unmarked grave.
I'm not kidding.
I mean, for YouTube's sake, I am.
But...
No, I'm not.
Anyway, It's a Wonderful Life captures the Christmas spirit better than any other film.
And it brings in the supernatural element of the holiday in a way that the Christmas story does not, which is why it gets edged out on the list by It's a Wonderful Life.
Now, yes, yes, George Bailey is a bit of a commie.
Sure, he is a bit of a commie.
But, you know, the film is still great.
I don't know.
It's able to overcome that.
That's how great the film is.
Now, on a personal note, I will say that the major challenge in my marriage And I don't want to get into airing Dirty Laundry, especially not in my own family, my marriage, but this is a major challenge, is that my wife refuses to watch this movie with me.
She won't watch it.
We go through this every year.
She calls it boring.
Every time she says that, it cuts me.
It cuts me to my core.
I weep hysterically.
In my heart.
I mean, not physically, but in my soul, I'm crying.
So not everybody appreciates this movie.
Sometimes in a tragic situation, there may be people close to you who don't appreciate it.
But they're wrong.
This is the greatest Christmas film of all time, period.
I mean, that's it.
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Now, as for the most overrated Christmas films, and I'm not going to get into, like, listing, you know, actual titles...
Because the most overrated and the worst Christmas movies of all time, those are every Christmas movie made after the year 1994. No shit.
Every single one, without exception.
The Santa Claus in 1994 was the last decent Christmas film.
Not great.
Not great.
But decent.
Home Alone was a couple years before.
I think it was 1992 or something.
That was good.
Better than decent, not great.
Everything after that, everything after that has been trash.
It has all been bad.
Same for Christmas songs too, by the way.
by the way, this is also the cutoff for Christmas songs.
I don't want a lot for Christmas, I have just nothing I mean.
1994, no good Christmas song or movie has been made after I don't know why, but that's it.
Exactly 30 years ago.
Don't come to me talking about elf.
Drop the whole elf thing.
Okay, I can already hear some of you people.
What about elf?
Elf came at it.
Elf, no.
You disgust me.
How can you live with yourself?
No.
I just watched Elf again with my kids.
Like pretty much every Will Ferrell movie during that run, Elf was a funny idea for an SNL skit, maybe, stretched out about 20 times longer than it should have been.
It wears out its welcome midway through the first act.
And by the third act, whatever charm it had has long since died, along with my Christmas cheer and my hopes for the future.
All of it is dead by the end of that movie.
You also see in Elf, this thing that they do now in Christmas movies, where by the end of it, it's like, whatever, they're out in the city and all the people are there and they're all watching and there's some big, you know, dramatic scene unfolding and all that kind of stuff.
It's just not, it's just not good.
What else is there?
I mean, don't you dare suggest the Jim Carrey Grinch abomination.
The Grinch!
I certainly don't want to hear about whatever bullshit The Rock just put out.
We got Snowman!
You know, every year it's stuff like that now.
The Rock is playing whoever and the Santa's an action hero now.
Time for some season's beatings.
It's all bad.
All of it is bad.
It's all terrible.
Hollywood, for the last 30 years, has forgotten how to make Christmas movies.
Even the mildly entertaining ones are still missing something, okay?
They're missing the essence of the Christmas film.
They're missing Christmas spirit.
I'm gonna stick my whole fist up your...
That's what they're missing.
You can't...
It's unquantifiable, but you can't quite...
Figure it out.
It's just not there.
There's something.
It's just not there.
It's the same with the Christmas songs.
They just don't have that spirit.
You listen to a Christmas song that was made in the 40s or the 50s.
All of them have Christmas spirit.
And you listen to those songs and you're like, that's a Christmas song.
That's what a Christmas song is supposed to sound like.
It feels like Christmas.
Every single song in the last 30 years doesn't feel like Christmas.
It just doesn't feel like it.
So they're all bad.
That's not up for discussion.
But it's okay.
Because we don't need...
New Christmas movies.
We have the two greatest, which you can watch every year as we do in our family.
Well, it's a wonderful life.
I have to watch alone.
I have to sit and watch it alone because nobody will watch it.
My kid's been poisoned against this movie by my wife.
She's told them all it's...
I almost got them to watch it the other day and I put it on.
And then my son goes, oh, it's black and white?
Yes, it's black and white.
Okay?
You don't need...
The story is what colors it in.
You won't even notice that it's black and white when you start watching it.
It's so magical that it doesn't need to be in color.
That's what I said.
They didn't want to watch it.
They didn't want to watch it.
It's black and white.
Anyway, you don't need any other Christmas movies.
You have two.
That's all you need.
Don't be greedy, you brats.
Also, Merry Christmas.
I have a question for you.
Actually, two.
What about Jingle All the Way?
That was in 96. How do you fall on that?
Jingle All the Way?
Are you kidding me?
Is that a serious question?
Okay.
That's actually...
That's where Christmas movies...
Well, I'm glad you brought that up.
That's where Christmas movies...
That's where they broke.
Put that cookie down!
Now!
Arnold Schwarzenegger killed Christmas movies.
Okay, and then what about Polar Express?
When did that come out?
2004. Look, there are exceptions to every rule, I guess.
That one has it.
Yeah, that one does have the Christmas spirit.
It's not great.
It's decent, so...
Whatever.
So there's been one.
There's been one in 30 years.
Okay, great.
I'm glad we got a clarification.
Okay, good.
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