Here are 5 essential holiday movies to watch this season

Everyone loves a good holiday movie. But how many good ones are there, really?

Well, enough at least to make a short list.

There are the obvious choices, which the following list includes. But there are also ones that seem less obvious because the movie isn’t focused solely on a holiday like Christmas, even though the holiday season remains an integral part of the story. So, in no particular order, here is a list of five essential holiday movies.

‘Elf’

When “Elf” premiered in November 2003, few could have predicted it would become the perennial holiday favorite that it has.

Will Ferrell plays an elf named Buddy who is actually the size of a typical human. It turns out that he was accidentally transported to the North Pole as a toddler and ended up being raised by Santa’s elves. Sensing something is wrong, Buddy travels to New York in search of his biological father and hilarity ensues.

Think of Ferrell at his funniest in those classic “Saturday Night Live” sketches. But “Elf” also has a lot of heart and heart-warming moments.

“This movie could have ended up being really stupid if it hadn’t been for Will Ferrell’s performance,” Bob Newhart told me in an interview about a year after the film was released. Newhart plays Papa Elf.

The movie’s amazing cast also includes Zooey Deschanel, James Caan, Mary Steenburgen and the late Ed Asner as Santa Claus, a role the self-described “non-practicing Jew” was born to play.

‘A Christmas Carol’

There are so many “Christmas Carol” movies, it’s hard to keep track of them all. So, which screen version of the Charles Dickens classic should you absolutely make time for?

For what it’s worth, I would highly recommend the 1951 British version starring Scottish character actor Alastair Sim as Ebenezer Scrooge. His performance tops those of all the other actors who have played Scrooge on film, including George C. Scott.

In a very controlled performance, Sim mainly lets Scrooge’s emotions simmer beneath the surface. But there’s a lot of power in his words and as he moves from scene to scene one can practically feel the chill in his wake.

This movie will make you cry as it reflects on the heartbreaking parts of Scrooge’s early life.

And after Scrooge is visited by the three spirits, Sim rides the wave of his epiphany inviting the audience to giggle right along with him. It’s this perfect embodiment of the character that allows the viewer to fully grasp Dickens’ message.

If you have trouble finding it, Turner Classic Movies makes a point of airing it at least once annually.

’Lady in the Lake’

How can a Philip Marlowe film noir be on this list? Well, while holidays aren’t at the heart of the story, a Christmas theme runs through the movie nonetheless.

This murder mystery is an adaptation of a 1943 Raymond Chandler novel and it is stylistically unique — the entire film is shot from the viewpoint of the central character played by Robert Montgomery, who also directs the film. In other words, when he gets punched in the face, you get punched in the face, so to speak.

The story has some humorous dialogue but it’s very dark and spooky with the only music provided by a wordless vocal chorus. Only the Christmastime setting brightens up the film at certain points. For example, the opening credits are shown on a series of Christmas cards, which turn out to be concealing a gun.

On Christmas Eve, Marlowe’s car is run off the road. He eventually crawls to a pay phone and calls a female acquaintance played by Audrey Totter. She takes him to her apartment so he can recover from his injuries and they spend Christmas day together … and (spoiler alert) fall in love.

‘It’s a Wonderful Life’

Sure, this is low-hanging fruit. But the fruit isn’t any less sweet.

No matter how many times you’ve seen this movie, it still resonates — perhaps even more so in times like these.

In “It’s a Wonderful Life,” tough times have brought George Bailey (James Stewart) to the brink — or, as he says with tears in his eyes in one indelible scene, “God, I’m at the end of my rope.” He is pleading for help as he contemplates suicide.

Later Stewart admitted the tears were real.

He had stepped away from the movies to serve as a fighter pilot during World War II and spent some five years away from Hollywood – not making a full-length motion picture between 1942 and 1946.

“It’s a Wonderful Life” was Stewart’s first post-war movie. As he was shooting his scenes, he later said, he honestly wasn’t sure if he still had the ability to act at a professional level. Stewart’s real-life insecurities led him to identify with the character so strongly that he was really crying in that scene.

When director Frank Capra asked Stewart if he could do an identical take so Capra could improve the shot, Stewart said he couldn’t.

Because Stewart is an Indiana, Pa., native, some have mistakenly concluded that the movie was shot there. The incorrect notion hasn’t hurt tourism in Indiana but the movie was actually made in Hollywood. However, Seneca Falls, N.Y., claims to be the inspiration for “Wonderful Life’s” fictional setting of Bedford Falls.

‘A Christmas Story’

Even though the jokes — the tongue on the ice bit and “You’ll shoot your eye out, kid”— are nearly 40 years old and the movie airs round the clock on Turner Broadcasting stations on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, people can’t get enough of this movie.

Why? Because it’s anchored by one of the best Christmas movie scripts ever written. Screenwriter Jean Shepherd is drawing on childhood memories — with some embellishment — that perfectly capture a cultural slice of late 1930s/early ’40s Americana.

There’s the central character of Ralphie (Peter Billingsley), representing Shepherd’s younger self — and his infatuation with the Little Orphan Annie Secret Society Decoder Pin and the Red Ryder B.B. Gun. The latter a gift from Santa despite Ralphie’s having dropped an F bomb in the hilarious tire-changing scene.

It’s all narrated by Shepherd, as an older Ralphie, with several scenes stolen by Darren McGavin as the father. McGavin brings the biggest laughs in the movie as he battles the house’s unreliable furnace, the neighbor’s dogs who get loose and invade the kitchen, and the mother (Melinda Dillon) who’s none too happy about his being awarded a garish lamp with a female leg in a fishnet stocking forming the base.

“A Christmas Story” is a movie the whole family can enjoy. After all, who can’t relate to being fixated on one extra special toy for Christmas — and (spoiler alert, as if anyone in America doesn’t know the ending by now) — actually getting it.