We're unwrapping the best Christmas movies of the year for the perfect seasonal treat. Consider it our holiday gift to you!
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10 New Christmas Movies for 2024 to Add to Your Watch List
Updated on Nov. 27, 2024
The truth is, the bustling onslaught of 2024 Christmas movies actually started well before Halloween. But, hello? Of course it did. With all due respect to eggnog and caroling, no annual holiday tradition can compare with watching those warm fuzzies. Each offering presents a spectrum of love and compassion, togetherness and humor, good tidings and a Santa Claus appearance. And if there’s a long-lost romance and mistletoe kiss involved, even better.
Now that we’ve all traded pumpkins for gingerbread, ’tis the right moment to highlight this year’s Christmas movies, which range from heartwarming romances to hilarious comedies to edge-of-your-seat thrillers. Fear not: Once you’ve parsed through these 10 treats, It’s a Wonderful Life, The Polar Express, Elf, Love Actually, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation and Die Hard will all be waiting … with bells on.
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Meet Me Next Christmas
Netflix
Release date: Nov. 6
Hit rom-com alert! Netflix audiences have fallen in love with Meet Me Next Christmas since it premiered in early November. Layla (Christina Milian) spends 32 hours running around New York City in the hopes of acquiring a ticket to see the a capella group Pentatonix at its sold-out Christmas Eve concert. (Pentatonix isn’t Taylor Swift, but just go with it.) Why the rush? Because she’s desperate to reconnect with a guy (Kofi Siriboe) at the show. Layla enlists the help of Teddy (Devale Ellis), a private concierge who pulls out all the stops to nab those tickets. And let’s just say that love is in the Big Apple air.
Hot Frosty
Netflix
Release date: Nov. 13
Well, look which viral sensation recently reached the top slot on Netflix. (Your move, Squid Game 2.) A non-kiddie take on Frosty the Snowman, Hot Frosty stars Christmas movie queen Lacey Chabert as a lonely widow who runs the local diner (naturally) but has let her own house fall apart. She accepts a red scarf at a thrift shop and places it on a ridiculously chiseled snowman. Voila! Thanks to the power of Christmas magic, the snowy sculpture soon comes to life in the form of hunky “Jack,” as played by Dustin Milligan from Schitt’s Creek. High jinks and a sweet romance ensue. Just don’t think about the biology of it all.
Red One
In theaters
Release date: Nov. 17
The weekend before Glicked (that’s Wicked and Gladiator II for the uninitiated) touched down at the box office, this action comedy—rated PG-13, FYI—opened at No. 1 globally despite middling reviews. Dwayne Johnson stars as Callum Drift, the ready-to-retire head of security detail for Santa Claus himself (a very jacked J.K. Simmons). After big red is kidnapped, Callum teams up with hacker Jack O’Malley (Chris Evans) to track him down. In their mission to find Santa and save the holiday, the two journey through various Christmas myths. A visit to Santa’s brother Krampus (Kristofer Hivju) and a slap-off, anyone?
The Merry Gentlemen
Netflix
Release date: Nov. 20
A festive Magic Mike? Yessss. New York City girl Ashley (Britt Robertson), newly booted from her Rockettes-like dance troupe, heads home for the holidays and learns that her parents (Michael Gross and Beth Broderick) will lose their small-town club if they can’t come up with $30,000. The solution? Ashley fibs to the landlord that she’s planning an all-male dance revue, dubbed the Merry Gentlemen, to raise the money. Chad Michael Murray, as a hot carpenter/handyman, performs; so does Grease 2 star Maxwell Caulfield. Though this is a bit more risqué than its TV-PG rating suggests, Murray insists The Merry Gentlemen is “not gratuitous.”
Dear Santa
Paramount+
Release date: Nov. 25
In this dark comedy, a little kid (Robert Timothy Smith) who’s a very bad speller writes a letter to Santa for Christmas and inadvertently addresses his missive to Satan. The note makes its way to Hell, where the dark lord himself (Jack Black) receives it. Satan decides to meet the kid to lure him to the dark side—but the tyke proves difficult to corrupt. Fun for everyone? Well, let’s just say Dear Santa is directed by Bobby Farrelly, whose credits include Dumb and Dumber, There’s Something About Mary and Shallow Hal (which also starred Black).
Our Little Secret
Netflix
Release date: Nov. 27
Two years after Lindsay Lohan made her holiday-movie debut in Falling for Christmas, she returns in the new yuletide rom-com Our Little Secret. She and Ian Harding (Pretty Little Liars) are two exes who unexpectedly reunite under the same roof over the holidays and realize that their current partners are siblings. (Her boyfriend’s mom is played by the great Kristin Chenoweth, the original Galinda in Wicked on Broadway.) Adding to the shenanigans: At one point, Lohan’s character realizes that some gummy candies that she just ingested are laced with an, ahem, unexpected ingredient. So, yes, watch after the kids’ bedtimes.
Nutcrackers
Hulu
Release date: Nov. 29
Here’s a genuinely sweet and heartwarming tale for the whole family. Promise. Ben Stiller—in his first movie role since 2017—plays a Chicago real-estate exec tasked with overseeing his four rambunctious nephews on their Ohio farm after their parents tragically die in an accident. The festive spirit kicks in when the boys, played by real-life brothers in their acting debuts, decide to stage their own quirky production of the Tchaikovsky classic The Nutcracker just in time for the holidays.
Holiday Touchdown: A Chiefs Love Story
Hallmark Channel
Release date: Nov. 30
Of Hallmark’s 47 holiday movies this year, this one could very well score the biggest among viewers. Alana (Hunter King) is a Kansas City Chiefs superfan in a family full of ’em. When the championship football team announces a “Fan of the Year” contest, she knows they’ll be a shoo-in for the prize. But she doesn’t count on meeting and falling for Derrick (Tyler Hynes), the team’s director of fan engagement. Donna Kelce, wearing the No. 87 jersey of her son Travis, appears as the manager of Kansas City BBQ restaurant Norma & Nic’s.
The Christmas Quest
Hallmark Channel
Release date: Dec. 1
Lacey Chabert has already gone back to her Hallmark roots! And how fitting that she portrays an archeologist. In The Christmas Quest, Chabert’s Stefanie and her ex-husband (Kristoffer Polaha, another network stalwart), an expert in ancient Norse languages, are sent to Iceland during the holiday season to search for the legendary treasure of the Yule Lads. When others join in the hunt, the pair get pulled into an adventure as they try to keep the treasure from falling into the wrong hands … and perhaps fall back in love with each other. (That’s what we’re guessing, at least—this is the Hallmark Channel!) This one was shot on location in Iceland.
Carry-On
Netflix
Release date: Dec. 13
You want to talk holiday-travel nightmare? In Carry-On, an adults-only thriller, an inexperienced and unhappy TSA agent (Taron Egerton) is blackmailed by a mysterious traveler (Jason Bateman) into letting a dangerous package slip through the X-ray scanner and onto a Christmas Eve flight. With the lives of everyone on board and in the airport suddenly in peril, the two engage in a battle of wits. In the spirit of Bruce Willis’s iconic John McClane, yippee-ki-yay!
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Sources:
- Variety: “‘Meet Me Next Christmas’ Stars Christina Milian and Devale Ellis on Crafting the Perfect Kiss”
- USA Today: “Netflix’s No. 1 movie ‘Hot Frosty’ has gone viral online: See the internet’s reaction”
- Deadline: “Dwayne Johnson & Chris Evans Christmas Pic ‘Red One’ Stuffing $100M In Global Box Office Bag”
- Variety: “Chad Michael Murray on Six-Hour Dance Lessons for ‘Merry Gentlemen,’ ‘One Tree Hill’ Revival Rumors and Facing Ageism in Hollywood”
- The Hollywood Reporter: “‘Holiday Touchdown: A Chiefs Love Story’ Trailer Sees Hunter King, Tyler Hynes Spark Romance”
- Entertainment Weekly: “Carry-On gives Taron Egerton’s TSA agent a luggage disaster in exclusive first look”
