Christmas is here! For many, that means a few cozy nights on the couch, watching Christmas movies with the people you love. Home Alone, Elf, It’s a Wonderful Life, and so many others are on regular rotation this time of year, but there’s a deep well of holiday films that a lot of movie fans overlook — Hallmark Christmas movies.
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Hallmark may have earned a reputation for redundant, lackluster TV movies over the past couple of decades, but the folks that actually tune in to the annual Countdown to Christmas know that a tide has turned for the network. There are a ton of diamonds littered throughout the rough.
You may not have watched Hallmark movies before, and there are a lot of them that are exactly what you think they are, but the network has recently been in the business of breaking with its own traditions and trying new things around the holidays. This has resulted in some pretty enjoyable movies that are absolutely worth checking out for Christmas.
Three Wise Men and a Baby
Just two years ago, Hallmark released a movie that marked the biggest departure from its formula yet. The massive success of Three Wise Men and a Baby not only earned the film a sequel (that’s just as good as the first), but it also helped change the way Hallmark approached Countdown to Christmas films, opening doors for all sorts of different stories that don’t fit the network’s traditional mold.
In this holiday spin on Three Men and a Baby, the smash hit TV movie is one of the only films in Hallmark Christmas history to focus almost entirely on male leads. There are love stories woven into the plot, but the main tale of the film is about three brothers who are tasked with taking care of a mysterious baby in the week leading up to Christmas. A big reason for its success is the all-star cast, which is led by a trio of popular Hallmark leading men: Andrew Walker, Paul Campbell, and Tyler Hynes.
The sequel, Three Wiser Men and a Boy, was released this year and is also worth seeking out.
The Christmas Train
The Christmas Train has quite simply the best cast ever assembled for a Hallmark Christmas movie. It really isn’t even all that close.
The film stars Dermot Mulroney as a journalist who takes the train from Washington D.C. to Los Angeles at Christmastime, hoping for some inspiration on a story about his late father. He ends up befriending several other passengers and rekindling an old flame in the process.
In addition to Mulroney, The Christmas Train stars Danny Glover, Kimberly Williams-Paisley, and Joan Cusack. Just a great group of four actors who could anchor a theatrical rom-com, nevermind a Hallmark holiday entry.
[RELATED: Where You Recognize the Biggest Hallmark Holiday Stars]
The Santa Summit
This is one of the best movies to watch if you’re unsure about checking out a Hallmark Christmas movie. The Santa Summit is nothing like what you have pictured in your head, focusing the story on the evolution of friendships and how difficult it can be to wrestle with adulthood.
The Santa Summit follows a trio of teachers and close friends who — for different reasons — embark together on a city-wide bar crawl where everyone dresses like Santa Claus. One friend is still recovering from a difficult breakup, one is hoping to cross paths with her nerdy crush, and the third is just begrudgingly going along with the plan. After a meet-cute goes awry (due to everyone looking like Santa Claus), the three pals dedicate the night to finding the mysterious charmer, and all sorts of hijinks ensue.
This is a very accessible comedy that will appeal to longtime Hallmark fans, as well as folks who have never cared to watch a movie from the network. It might also be Hallmark’s outright funniest holiday film to-date.
Round and Round
Not every great Hallmark movie is about Christmas. Released last year, Round and Round is a hilarious (and surprisingly nerdy) romantic comedy that takes a page out of the book of Groundhog Day.
Yes, this is a time loop movie, and it’s just a ton of fun from start to finish. Starring the always funny Vic Michaelis, Round and Round is about a writer in a rut that is heading back to her family home for the seventh night of Hanukkah. One spin of an old family dreidel, however, sends her into a time loop where she repeats that very same day again and again.
Come for the time loop rom-com, stay for one of the few genuinely surprising twists Hallmark has ever delivered in a holiday film.
A Biltmore Christmas
2023 was a seriously historic year for Hallmark’s Countdown to Christmas. The Santa Summit and Round and Round brought the network some of its best comedies in ages, while A Biltmore Christmas delivered one of the most genuine and believable romances we’ve seen on TV in some time.
A Biltmore Christmas follows a screenwriter who has been hired to pen a remake of an iconic Christmas movie from Hollywood’s golden age. In order to get some inspiration, the studio sends her to the historic Biltmore estate, where the original movie was filmed. One thing leads to another and she travels back in time to the actual production of the Christmas classic, where she falls in love with the film’s leading man (who died not long after the movie was made).
It’s a wonderful love story with that doubles as a love letter to old Hollywood. What more could you ask for?
The Most Wonderful Time of the Year
The Most Wonderful Time of the Year has endured as one of the most iconic and beloved Hallmark Christmas movies — and for good reason. This is the quintessential Hallmark movie, setting a unique (and very high) standard for everything that has come since.
Released back in 2008, The Most Wonderful Time of the Year is about a business-minded single mom whose holiday season is flipped upside-down when her eccentric uncle brings a charming stranger into town. Yes, that sounds very formulaic for Hallmark, but this is one of those movies that created the mold so few others have been able to break (until recently).
To top it all off, the eccentric uncle is played by none other than Henry Winkler.
Sugarplummed
The newest movie on this list, Sugarplummed is one of the few films that you know from the very first time it airs that it already has a spot cemented in the all-time Hallmark holiday canon.
Not to say that Sugarplummed is the best movie Hallmark has ever been released, but it is certainly one of the most important for the network. The film kicks off with a commercial for a knockoff version of the Hallmark Channel that doesn’t pull any punches, going right after the formulaic films that the network has become so well known for over the years. This self-aware satire takes things a step further as the main character from those movies is brought into the real world, where not everything can be wrapped up in a perfect bow on Christmas Eve.
Sugarplummed is not only a response to the criticism that Hallmark has generated over the years, but also an acknowledgement of the lackluster movies that unfortunately became a staple of the network for quite a while. The last couple of years have provided plenty of evidence that Hallmark has entered a new era, one where creative ideas like Sugarplummed actually get a chance to flourish.
