"a-christmas-carol"

For a host of reasons, some movies grow stronger with time, while others fade into relics, capturing a moment in history that seems irrelevant, even quaint today. The sheer impact and staying power of Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life” (1946) reflects both a gifted director at the peak of his talents, and a script dealing in universal truths that always resonate with thinking, feeling audiences.

Top-ten lists of holiday films abound right about now, but what about picking the top three Christmas movies ever made? Certainly there's plenty to choose from. Christmas movies are almost a genre unto themselves: between live-action and animated features, there are literally hundreds of titles out there. Inevitably, some are pretty bad, others amusingly cheesy.

With streaming, you get that thing we all crave: immediate gratification. Complete spontaneity, no need to plan ahead. And that’s a big deal over the holidays, when we’re all over-stressed, overbooked, overloaded. Who has time to think about what to watch on Christmas Eve before you’re actually there?