Itinerary, December 7-10

Rick Retro’s Realm, Project #1: 2024 Christmas Tour – Classic TV Christmas specials for the whole family and a slasher flick that definitely isn't.

As a quick “Behind the Scenes” note, I think it will be valuable to add more time between when I watch movies/write reviews and when I publish them to you. That allows for more re-reads before I send out my final polished review. So I will be scouting on ahead as time allows. The Itinerary dates will then best be interpreted as the date of the evening you would want to watch a film in order to follow along or comment on the review that will be posted the following morning. I’ll still include my actual day of viewing for the review at the start of each one.

Note over—on with the Tour Itinerary.

Leaving behind the older 20th century Christmas films, we will now visit some Christmas classics of the 1960s-1970s.

Most of these are considered to be TV specials and you’ve probably seen many or all of them going way back to your childhood. We’re visiting the six most well-known of many, including the first four Christmas specials by Rankin-Bass Productions, who went on to make many more, and also specials for other holidays.

We will be making two stops a night from December 7 to 9. The number in parentheses at the end of each listing is how many All-Time Best Christmas Movies lists each entry was included on, out of 10 lists I checked.

December 7:
1964 “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” (sp) !@ (stop-motion animation), 52m (9)
1965 “A Charlie Brown Christmas” (sp) @ (traditional animation), 25m (10)

December 8:
1966 “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” (sp) @, 25m (9)
1968 “The Little Drummer Boy” (sp) !@, 25m (3)

December 9:
1969 “Frosty the Snowman” (sp) @, 25m (4)
1970 “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town” (sp) !@, 51m (3)

On December 10 our journey takes a surprising turn. Lots of you will probably want to skip this one. It's a 1974 Canadian film titled Black Christmas, clocking in at 1h 38m. It made 8 of the 10 all-time Christmas lists I consulted, so I’m interested, but it’s considered to be one of the first horror films ever to be made in the “slasher” sub-genre, so no apologies are necessary if you are not interested! I actually do enjoy the horror genre if an entry is particularly scary or particularly funny (intentionally or not!) So with all the “Best” lists this landed on, I’ve got my fingers crossed!

Don’t forget the popcorn!

Originally posted to text group 2024-12-07
Last updated 2025-01-31

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