Looking for a Christmas Day movie? Try A Dingo Ate My Christmas Spirit

You’ve sat down on the couch, post-Christmas lunch, and turned on the telly.

What great Christmas film are you and the family going to watch? Looking for a laugh, it might be Elf. Looking for nostalgia, then you’ve got It’s a Wonderful Life. Keep the kids amused with Home Alone (but steer-clear of its sequels).

Credit: Simon Letch

And if you want some top-shelf Christmas movie, you can’t go past Die Hard.

But there is a cohort of films out there, grabbing more and more of our attention (and our cash) that highlight how art, technology and commerce have combined to commercialise Christmas with an intensity that would melt Frosty the Snowman.

Hallmark, once the byword for saccharine greeting cards, has carved out a niche for sickly sweet Christmas movies.

It produces about 40 of these almost every year so they can be aired on its own channel, on free-to-air stations such as Nine (the owner of this masthead) or through streaming services.

It’s a Wonderful Life … if you like Christmas movies.

Since October, Hallmark has been running a “countdown to Christmas” on its eponymous channel.

That’s included series and movies with titles such as A Royal Montana Christmas, Christmas on Duty, Finding Mr. Christmas, Three Wisest Men and Oy to the World!.

Actors are almost interchangeable. Oy to the World! features Canadian actor Brooke D’Orsay, who has appeared in 10 Christmas-themed movies since 2017 including Deck the Halls on Cherry Lane, Nostalgic Christmas and Christmas in........

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