Stacy Conradt
The Quick 10: The 10 Worst Christmas Movies Ever
by Stacy Conradt - December 10, 2008 - 3:08 PM

Q10

I did Holiday Horror the other day, so this is similar… just a different brand of horror. This list is from the guys over at Film School Rejects. FSR is a really fascinating site, by the way – it’s not too difficult to lose a couple of hours there. Oh, and I promise, this is my last holiday movie post! At least until I can start posting about romances for Valentine’s Day. And I kind of hate romances, so that probably won’t happen. I digress.

martians10. Santa Claus Conquers the Martians. My friends and I went through a phase a couple of summers ago where we got together once a week to watch Mystery Science Theater 3000 movies, but alas, this one never made the list. I might have to add it to the Netflix queue for the season, though.
9. The Nativity Story, the 2006 version with Keisha Castle-Hughes. I haven’t seen this one, so I can’t vouch for its awfulness. Anyone?
8. Fred Claus. Really? Was it that bad? I mean, I’m not a huge Vince Vaughn fan, but I imagine that with him and Paul Giamatti, it must have had an amusing moment or two.
7. Miracle on 34th Street. Whoa, I know what you’re thinking – “WHAT?!” But it’s OK – they mean the 1994 remake. And they have a point – why do they keep remaking such a great classic?
6. The Santa Clause 2. I belong to a movie club (which is stupid in and of itself, I realize) and accidentally forgot to mail in the card that declines the order for the month. I ended up with the box set: Santa Clause 1, 2 and 3. My husband was horrified. As was I.

5. Christmas with the Kranks. When was the last time Tim Allen was in a good movie?

4. Deck the Halls. I remember thinking this was a horrible idea when the trailers came out a couple of years ago – Danny DeVito vs. Matthew Broderick in a Christmas Light Spectacular showdown. Look, no one is going to do over-the-top Christmas lights like Clark W. Griswold, so I don’t even see the point in making an entire movie that will fail to live up to Clark punching Santa Claus in the face and karate chopping Rudolph’s antlers.

3. Black Christmas, which I mentioned in the horror movie post. Film School Rejects specifies that it’s the 2006 version that they hated, despite gratuitous nudity.

short2. The Santa Clause 3. This picture of Martin Short kind of gives me the chills. No pun intended (he’s playing Jack Frost).
1. Surviving Christmas. I admit, I’ve seen that one. Ben Affleck and James Gandolfini. I’m not saying it’s cinematic genius, but I feel like it’s definitely more worthwhile than The Santa Clause 3.

What do you guys think? What other movies should Film School Rejects have included? They only considered flicks that were specifically about Christmas, so they don’t include movies such as Gremlins, which merely happened to take place during the holiday season. Leave your most-hated holiday movies in the comments!

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Comments (36)

  1. The Miracle on 34th Street remake from the 1990s is not half bad. The truly HORRIBLE Mo34S is the 1970s tv version with David Hartman and Sebastain Cabot (Mr. French from Family Affair) as Santa. Truly, TRULY awful!

    posted by beth on 12-10-2008 at 3:11 pm

  2. Jingle All The Way- Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sinbad fighting over a hard to get present for their boys for Christmas.

    posted by Jared on 12-10-2008 at 3:26 pm

  3. Surviving Christmas is my sisnter-in-law’s favorite xmas movie.

    posted by andy on 12-10-2008 at 3:32 pm

  4. Last good Tim Allen movie: Galaxy Quest. Although the nod goes to Debra Zane, the casting director, who matched Tim Allen’s cheesiness to Shatner’s source material.

    posted by Matt on 12-10-2008 at 3:32 pm

  5. I liked The Nativity Story. I thought it was cute and sweet. I agree with most of the movies on the list other than that. I HATE the Santa Claus 2 and 3. The first one was okay but not great and I hate Tim Allen so much that I won’t even watch it.

    posted by The Queen on 12-10-2008 at 3:46 pm

  6. Gotta agree with Matt – Galaxy Quest was a great Tim Allen movie, but the last good movie he was in was Redbelt.

    posted by MadMup on 12-10-2008 at 4:02 pm

  7. I’m pleased to see my favorite (skewed) Xmas movies did not make either list: The Ref (with Denis Leary and Kevin Spacey) and Mixed Nuts (Steve Martin with a cast of every quirky actor in Hollywood, and an unknown Liev Schreiber as a loveable transvestite). It’s not Christmas for me ’til I’ve seen both of these.

    I’m not saying they’re GOOD, just that I love them.

    posted by terri on 12-10-2008 at 4:19 pm

  8. Actually, I have Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (on MST3K) as one of my holiday favs. It’s pretty much their best episode, no doubt due to the awesome source material.

    posted by Johnny Cat on 12-10-2008 at 4:23 pm

  9. Terri – The Ref IS one of the greatest Christmas films ever! :)

    posted by Deb on 12-10-2008 at 4:43 pm

  10. Mixed Nuts is great! Awesome early Adam Sandler (I love Grape Jelly!), and Madeline Kahn is brilliant. I’m gonna have to watch that tonight.

    posted by bas on 12-10-2008 at 4:44 pm

  11. Worst Christmas movie in my opinion is the live action Grinch with Jim Carrey. I watched it because my kids were. It totally sucked.

    As for Tim Allen I think Toy Story was his last good movie and he was only a voice in that.

    posted by Bill on 12-10-2008 at 4:46 pm

  12. I’m with Matt–Galaxy Quest was great! And there should be a law against Hollywood remakes of classic films. I can’t watch the 90′s version of Mo34St. without expecting “Santa” to say, “We have a T-Rex.”

    posted by Ryan on 12-10-2008 at 5:15 pm

  13. I would like to go ahead and add Home Alone 3. ABC Family has been playing it like crazy lately. I agree that Jingle all the Way should be there as well. I just recently saw Fred Claus, and although it is not Vaughn at his finest, I still thought it was a decent, family, Christmas movie. Just my opinion…

    posted by Jeremy on 12-10-2008 at 5:18 pm

  14. I’m with Jared…Jingle All The Way is TERRIBLE – has to be near the top of my “worst” list. My ReCaptcha is naked modesty…hehehe

    posted by Christian on 12-10-2008 at 5:20 pm

  15. That’s a good list. Although the Martians one really shouldn’t be in there, since it wasn’t really SUPPOSED to be good, unlike the others. Plus, it was released long before these others, which are all recent.

    Jingle All the Way can definitely replace it.

    and, uh, Andy? Your sister-in-law has HORRIBLE taste, sorry.

    posted by Mike M. on 12-10-2008 at 5:31 pm

  16. Ok not completely on subject, but I went see The Family Stone at the theatres with my mom thinking feel good holiday flick. I must say it was a depressing let down.

    Two holiday faves, Home Alone (the first one, and only one in my opinion) and Love Actually trumps all for a wonderful holiday movie!

    posted by Kaitlyn on 12-10-2008 at 5:42 pm

  17. Oh, Kaitlyn, you really made me just want to pull out “Love Actually” and watch it! No….must…study…. Maybe next week though!

    posted by kate on 12-10-2008 at 6:33 pm

  18. “Christmas with the Kranks” wasn’t THAT bad. If you want bad, though, just go turn on ABC Family and wait a while — you’ll see a whole slew of horrendously bad holiday made-for-TV movies.

    posted by M on 12-10-2008 at 6:35 pm

  19. Santa’s Slay. From the IMDB plot description: In the Christmas Eve of 2005, Santa Claus (Bill Goldberg) arrives in Hell Township killing the locals. The teenager Nicholas Yuleson (Douglas Smith) finds that his grandfather (Robert Culp) is actually an angel that defeated the devil’s son in a bet, and the evil creature has spent the last one thousand years playing a good Santa Claus, giving toys to the children. Now that the bet is over, Santa Claus wants revenge. Nicholas and his girlfriend Mary Mackenzie (Emilie de Ravin) try to escape from the killer and find a way to stop him until the end of Christmas.

    posted by Sean on 12-10-2008 at 6:55 pm

  20. or the Hallmark Channel

    posted by PartiallyDeflected on 12-10-2008 at 6:58 pm

  21. I disagree that Jingle All The Way is terrible… it is so good with terrible badness… just like the Godzilla movies of old where we know it’s a guy in a rubber costume and people pointing up saying “It’s Gozilla!” Oh it’s horrible and schmaltzy but the horrible badness makes it so entertaining
    Tim Allen has really got to get out of the Santa Clause thing… make more movies like Galaxy Quest

    posted by Sarah C. on 12-10-2008 at 7:21 pm

  22. I loved the Nativity Story. I agree on the other movies on the list.

    posted by avery on 12-10-2008 at 11:33 pm

  23. You completely left out the Hulk Hogan classic, “Santa with Muscles”.

    posted by mark on 12-11-2008 at 12:14 am

  24. I’m surprised the 1959 film entitled “Santa Claus” didn’t make the list. It’s another Christmas film that got the Mystery Science Theater 3000 treatment. It stars the jolly one himself as he fights against the devil for the emotional well-being of children everywhere (but mostly in Mexico). Notable moments include the appearance of Merlin (MERLIN???), a devil-induced dream that stars a supremely disturbing giant talking rag doll, and Santa’s use of such gadgets as an invisibility flower and a cocktail umbrella. Oh, and the wind-up reindeer will turn to dust if they don’t make it back to the North Pole before sunrise, leaving Santa to starve to death as his only sources of sustainance are foods derived from clouds. The filmmakers must have used some very special kinds of drugs to come up with this.

    On a lighter note, this film predicted the existence of Disneyland’s It’s a Small World Holiday by devoting the first 8 minutes or so to a medley of songs from every conceivable nation in the world (but mostly Mexico).

    posted by Harry on 12-11-2008 at 1:34 am

  25. How can everyone miss that Star Wars Christmas special?

    posted by Giovanni on 12-11-2008 at 2:27 am

  26. You HAVE to see Santa Concurs The Martians!!!! It’s one of the all time best MST3K’s!!!!!!!!!

    posted by Emily on 12-11-2008 at 9:18 am

  27. I think you should see a movie before you can call it the 9th worst Christmas movie ever.

    posted by NingNang on 12-11-2008 at 10:07 am

  28. @ NingNang: I totally agree! But it’s not actually my list, I was just commenting on the picks from the guys at FilmSchoolRejects.com. I’m assuming they have seen it :)

    posted by stacy on 12-11-2008 at 10:13 am

  29. I really REALLY dislike “It’s a Wonderful Life”. What a piece of schlock. What a waste of good actors. What a contrived, unsubtle, unfunny, hackneyed story. What a blatant attempt to cash in on the audience’s good feelings about Christmas without actually earning them, or really having anything to do with Christmas anyway.

    posted by Liza Jane on 12-11-2008 at 11:11 am

  30. So Kark Juddery touched on this a couple of days back. Here’s what I had to say about Santa Claus Conquers the Martians: I saw it when it first came out – at a Saturday matinee with hundreds of kids. Back then it was a good movie. The worst part though was my dad. He took us and stayed through the show. Fell asleep with his head way back and snored like you wouldn’t believe. Incredibly embarrassing. I still remember constantly nudging him. . . Dad… Dad… Wake up. . . There was nowhere else to go sit – the theater was packed. . .

    I really need to see the MST3K version.

    I don’t think Christmas With the Kranks belongs here. It’s certainly not that bad – the Botox scene was a riot.

    Marlo Thomas did a remake of It’s a Wonderful Life titled It Happened One Chirstmas – terrible.

    posted by gwdMaine on 12-11-2008 at 12:51 pm

  31. Eh… to each their own. I can’t stand the Santa Clause series or any of the remakes of old classics that try to update them to modern times. I like the old versions… we call ‘em classic for a reason.

    I actually really liked the Nativity Story… I’m surprised it’s on the list!

    I haven’t seen Santa Claus conquers the Martians… now I have to see it. Is it on par with Plan 9 from Outer Space? Anyone know where to look for it?

    @Jared – I actually like Jingle all the Way. What’s not to like about Ahnuld taking on a warehouse full of corrupt Santas?

    posted by Jason! on 12-11-2008 at 1:46 pm

  32. Wasn’t there some lame movie about kids stuck in an airport at Christmas that came out s few years ago. From the ads it looked horrible!

    posted by Shantastic on 12-11-2008 at 2:43 pm

  33. I’m surprised that the MSTied “Santa Claus Conquers the Martians” is available on DVD. Now I feel bad about watching it on YouTube.

    However, the “Santa Claus” episode isn’t available on DVD, and I heartily recommend watching it on YouTube. (Favorite line: “Santa’s laughter mocks the poor!”)

    posted by Sillstaw on 12-11-2008 at 4:19 pm

  34. I agree with the Jim Carrey Grinch – I got through about 10 minutes before I had to shut it off and return the DVD. HORRIBLE. I immediately watched the original cartoon version to purge any memory of the remake.

    posted by Dawn on 12-12-2008 at 3:47 pm

  35. I haven’t been subjected to The Nativity Story. My parents, however, were — actually paid whatever exorbitant amount you have to pay to see a movie in CT, to see this. My father fell asleep. My mother, a Catholic school teacher, likened it to “watching paint dry.”

    I thought Galaxy Quest was rather entertaining, and I HATE Tim Allen. Then again, I might just be enough of a Star Trek fiend to find something the rest of the planet finds deplorable to be quite entertaining. If that’s the case…has Tim Allen been in ANYTHING good?

    I’m probably proving this by thinking that “Santa’s Slay” sounds entertaining.

    posted by Caroline on 12-15-2008 at 12:51 pm

  36. What about Eight Crazy Nights with/by Adam Sandler. It’s more of a Hannukkah movie than a Christmas movie but God, it’s terrible.

    posted by amanda on 5-28-2011 at 5:28 am

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