Did you miss Santa Claus Conquers The Martians when it screened at the Experience Music Project in November? Did you miss much? You can find out in the book Have Yourself A Movie Little Christmas (Limelight Editions), so you’ll know what to pick up when you high tail it to your neighborhood video outlet, or the Seattle Public Library (which has an extensive library of films you can check out — for free!).
When people think of Christmas movies, classics like It’s A Wonderful Life and Miracle on 34th Street come to mind. And you’ll certainly find those covered here. But author Alonso Duralde shows there’s a lot more to holiday movies than you might guess, and the book’s nine chapters each cover a different type of Christmas movie. There are: Christmas movies for kids, Christmas movies for grown ups, Christmas comedies, Christmas tearjerkers and a whole chapter on 22 movie versions of A Christmas Carol.
Duralde also goes off the beaten with chapters on “Holiday Horror” (Tales From The Crypt and Night of the Hunter) and action films (Die Hard, Lady in the Lake), though those films tend to have a Christmas tie-in, rather than being movies solely about Christmas. And then there’s the chapter on Christmas duds, which is where the aforementioned Santa Claus Conquers The Martians shows up, along with such dubious delights as Santa Claus and the Ice Cream Bunny and Thomas Kinkade’s Christmas Cottage.
There’s a summary for each film, followed by a “Fun Facts” trivia listing, making this the kind of book that’s good to browse through. It should also help you find just the right holiday film to celebrate with.
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