Can We Talk 2

Is Die Hard A Christmas Movie?

If you watch TCM, the answer is yes. A Christmas movie has to start off with a dysfunctional family. That can be extremely dysfunctional or mildly or you might say it's a family with a little problem. It can be a single person, as in Miracle on 34th Street or Shop Around the Corner, but with dating or family issues. By the end of the movie, there has to be resolution and a reinforcement of the family unit. That happens in Die Hard' the terrorists who occupy most of the story just further complicate the family brokenness and aid inadvertently in its restoration.

The Hallmark movies qualify in that a grown child usually has left home for the big city, and the family is about to lose the poinsettia farm or the Christmas tree farm or whatever. Or said child feels she has outgrown the small town values and feels ashamed when caught mocking them. In the end, the farms are saved, "big business" does not build a ski resort or high rise condos, friendships and family are restored, and the right boy gets the right girl. If rich people or royalty are involved, they are brought down to earth, and the commoner who has intruded into their lives is appreciated and accepted. Happy endings all abound.

         With these formulas, you have movies like Scrooged, Bad Santa, and Bad Mom's Christmas. These qualify as Christmas movies since they all involve broken family relationships or broken people who are reconciled and redeemed by the movie's end. But they are NOT for children. The language and situations are adult oriented. I know adults who will not watch movies with prolific profanity or nudity or too many sexual references. (Bad Mom's might be the worse. They even swear in church, and there is a scene where a male stripper gets a wax job.) With TCM's parameters, not all Christmas movies are child worthy.

         Die Hard may be a Christmas movie, but it's probably too violent or scary for children under 10. Holiday Inn and White Christmas may be clean and wholesome, but children get bored with the adult story lines. For children, the story should be fantasy, as in Polar Express, involve children, or be told from a child's point of view.

         In fact using TCM criteria, we could take a look at the Nativity Story, not made into a movie all of its own, as far as I know, but tacked into some other ones with foreign accents. You start off with a dysfunctional family: a man and a woman newly betrothed who have not slept together and he finds out she's pregnant. He doesn't want to disgrace her or let her get stoned to death, but it's not his child. The "terrorists" are angels who show up to each of them, saying "Don't be afraid, just because I'm blazing bright light and look like something you've never seen before". The angel tells them, "Stay cool. Take a deep breath, it's going to be okay." They both go along, hardly knowing each other, two poor working class people traveling for taxation and registration. They have a baby in a cave or lean-to with scratchy straw and the smell of animals. That very night, shepherds smelling of sheep show up with tales of angels and heavenly messages. They want to see the newborn and say he's going to be a king. The young couple think they're crazy. What a madcap night this is! But there's the usual miracle and beauty of a healthy newborn baby who captures both their young hearts (she's just a young teenager). Within two years magi from faraway places show up with gifts and camels and worship their toddler son. What a strange marriage they've had. Now an angel shows up to bewildered Joseph to tell him to go home to Nazareth with his growing family.You could say they've resolved the conflict. So it could be a Christmas movie, maybe the ultimate one.