The Christmas TV Strategy Guide 2023 #07

This one is here just for the sheer ballerness of the channel scheduler; here you go, here’s 6 episodes of Columbo for you to start your Christmas Eve. No details or anything, just six of them. You have to respect that.

Now you’re talking! A big warm hot mug of cocoa of a movie, full of songs everyone knows. If you can tear yourself away from Columbo then this should make your Christmas Eve feel extra Christmassy

Another powerhouse iconic film, with a surprising amount of Nazis for a musical about a singing nun. Look, you can not watch it, its fine, its not everyone’s cup of tea. But the songs in this film are pretty much bulletproof and the joy in them is infectious. No one will blame you if you start singing, its fine.

Hey, remember when Kevin Costner was like the biggest name in cinema? And this film is probably the peak of that era, a proper old school swashbuckler that (despite the best efforts of Costner in the edit room) is totally stolen by Alan Rickman. A true Bank Holiday classic

Bravo to Channel 4 here, basically telling you to siddown whilst they inject pure Christmas directly into your veins. You’ve got not one but two Snowmans then the 90s version of Miracle on 34th Street. And yes, I know, the original is probably the better film but here you’ve got Richard Attenborough and the love interest wearing the coat he stole from the Dad in Home Alone and I just have so much more nostalgia for this film. And you end with Bake Off, you can’t argue with that

Gene Kelly is a stone cold genius, the absolute personification of the Movie Star ideal of the 40s. And here you have one of his best, a beautiful film full of amazing craft and songs and the dances! You have to respect a film that resolves its main character’s emotional journey with a 15 minute ballet sequence. Faultless.

The question is: do you prefer Home Alone or Home Alone 2? I mean, they are essentially the same film (I’ve got a video essay about that which has been knocking around for a while) so it depends on how you like your criminals smashed up I guess. Iron from the laundry vent or bricks from the roof? Paint cans or bannister? Icy steps or greasy ladders? The choice, as they say, is yours

Given that Channel 4 is using up all the Christmas for their channel, there isn’t much left over for Film4. But they put a good spread on; Star Trek was a great new take on the franchise, Taken remains the best of that genre (excluding John Wick and Nobody), Hollywood is great despite given more credence to the argument that Tarantino needs a producer who will say to him “90 minutes”, and Anchorman remains a very funny film. Are all these that Christmassy? Probably not, but then you can’t have sweets all the time can you?

More Clint! Each one is a bit of a case of diminishing returns as the first 2 are sequels to better films than don’t really bring anything new to the table. Hang Em High isn’t a sequel but it does sit just after the Dollars Trilogy and can’t really compare to those films. Its still good, but you can kind of tell that he wants to do things other than Westerns.

Dante’s Peak is the weaker of the two volcano films that came out in the same year in the 90s, mainly because it didn’t embrace the daftness and kept itself more towards the serious side. Its still good though, Brosnan is always good to watch and has good chemistry with Linda Hamilton. And we’ll chuck in Miss Congeniality 2 because I’m sure that we’ve had the first one on the the list prior to this so why not. And then you may as well watch Final Destination 5 because, jeez, they ended up making five of those? Blimey.

BBC4 veering all the place here; from the early 80s via the early 90s and back; I think the line up for the Last of The Summer’s Wine will be the classic line up, their equivalent of the Galacticos so that should be good, more Yes Minister because that was always great. A feature length One Foot In the Grave? Again, why not, and what a double bill to finish. I must have watched that Bruce and Ronnie’s Christmas special when it aired, thats just the sort of thing that would have been on the TV at my Nan’s. And then a Two Ronnies mystery show about a stolen turkey? Yes please, thank you very much

ITV4 pulls a crazy triple bill out of the bag here; the film where Rocky knocks out communism, the one film from the most infamous failed cinematic universe of all time and then Al Pacino in a gangster film with a beard. What a roller coaster that is

A ghost story followed by Nine to Five? It makes as much sense as everything else today so why not?