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Of course, neither I nor the Apollo boys really set foot on the moon, but I suppose many of you suspected as much already. Of the deception, that is. As they say, one small lie for man, one giant fraud perpetrated on mankind. Well, you saw Argo , right? You saw the lengths to which the CIA was willing to go in order to rescue a handful of U. Shooting a fake movie was all we were really doing, too. We wanted to save all million. Call it a massive fraud ; call it a government-run conspiracy — whatever. And speaking of soundstages, no moon landing was ever filmed in a Hollywood studio.
That much is true. They were filmed in North London. As a boy, I enjoyed looking up at the night sky from our Pennsylvania farm as much as the next guy. But the stars I really had my eye on were the ones out in Hollywood. And so as soon as I had my high school degree in hand, I headed out West to pursue my film-star dreams.
Writer Max Canard notes that young and inexperienced cameramen may have been chosen in order to cede control of their instruments to the legendary Stanley Kubrick. After a few years of waiting tables and playing an extra in crowd scenes, it had become abundantly clear that I had a face that belonged behind the camera.
About the time that President Kennedy was saying that America would put a man on the moon by the end of the decade, I moved back East, to New York; got married and started working as a cameraman, filming commercials for cereals, mouthwashes and toilet bowl cleaners for Madison Avenue ad agencies. It was every bit as crazy a world as you see in Mad Men , but creatively it was as inspiring as, well, a toilet bowl.
Strangelove at the Victoria Theater in the winter of changed my life. And so when I heard that its director, the already legendary Stanley Kubrick, was looking for a crew for his next big movie, I presumptuously sent in my application. Kubrick arrived promptly, carrying a thick pile of diagrams and charts.
He was disheveled, pulsating with energy. He looked like a mad scientist who had been interrupted in the middle of an epiphany.
Over tea, he explained to me how there had never been a truly realistic movie about space travel, and how in the film that would become A Space Odyssey , each scene would be absolutely authentic and on par with the latest that science had to offer. And then word finally came: I would need to sign a contract, kiss my wife and two small children goodbye and move to London for six months of filming, beginning in the summer of I was ready for the mission, even if the next frontier would prove to be beyond my wildest imaginings. London during the s was nothing like Austin Powers.
Manning the camera for Kubrick, one of the few directors at the time who knew anything about the equipment he relied on, was a lesson in humility. I came to realize that part of the reason a young and inexperienced cameraman like myself was chosen was my willingness to cede control of my own instrument to the maestro himself. From the start, Stanley — excuse me if I lapse into the familiar — was dedicated to making every aspect of as real as possible.
No detail was too small to consider. We had boatbuilders, sculptors, artists and even metalworkers on set. We had model-makers, for Chrissake. Truckloads of data and technical drawings and equipment would arrive routinely. Stanley insisted that the space hardware used in the film was scientifically accurate, an almost up-to-the-minute realism acquired from constant conversations with the NASA officials on the set.
My initial six-month term turned into a year, and then three years. I ended up moving my family to London. A wealthy manufacturer pays an impoverished single mother who works in his factory, and her daughter, to pretend to be his "family" at Christmastime, in order to impress a visiting old-fashioned tycoon interested in buying his company. A Boyfriend for Christmas. Santa Claus is preparing to retire, and grooms an American businesswoman Whoopi Goldberg to be his replacement.
Bob, and especially to a live Christmas Eve show her producer has planned. Carol for Another Christmas. Catch a Christmas Star. A young girl attempts to reunite her father with his high school sweetheart, who has since become a successful pop singer. In a world where the holidays are run by the efficient Bureau of Yuletide Affairs, a bitter and burned-out Ghost of Christmas Past decides to go AWOL while on a "mission" and leave his "target" stranded in A Child's Christmases in Wales.
Christmas at Water's Edge. An angel teams with a spoiled college coed to organize a Christmas concert at a community youth center.
Christmas to Remember, A TV — A city-bred boy learns a lot when he goes and lives with his grandparents on their farm. Can anyone please help? A stop motion claymation featuring the California Raisins and many Christmas songs. By Christmas , we had once again finished filming a space masterpiece in London. Christmas Box, The TV — A ski-shop owner reluctantly moves himself, his wife, and his daughter in to an estate as live-in help for an elderly widow.
Based on the bestselling book of the same name, a couple and their daughter move in with a widow and discover a box containing the answer to the first gift of Christmas. A Grinch-like thief retreats to her hometown for Christmas.
Can the spirit of Christmas, combined with a stint babysitting her niece and nephew, rid her of her wicked ways? A soldier serving in Afghanistan receives a Christmas card from a Californian woman he has never met. He visits the town to find the inspiration behind the card. Scott as Ebenezer Scrooge, an old miser who makes excuses for his uncaring nature learns real compassion when three ghosts visit him on Christmas Eve. A Hallmark Channel adaptation of the famous story.
Grant as Bob Cratchit. Kelsey Grammer is Scrooge in this musical adaptation of the Dickens story. Christmas Comes to Willow Creek. Two truck-driving brothers attempt to transport a load of Christmas gifts from California to an economically strapped Alaska town. A stressed-out working couple hire a consultant to help them plan an elaborate Christmas party for the wife's boss and husband's relatives.
Tells the story of the inspiration behind Thomas Kinkade 's painting The Christmas Cottage , and how the artist was motivated to begin his career after discovering his mother was in danger of losing their family home. Sloan is beautiful, stylish, and on the fast track to success at her public relations firm. After her client Caitlin dies and becomes her own personal ghost of Christmas past, present, and future; she finds out first hand that her unethical ways needs to change and reuniting with a past jilted lover may be the answer.
In a remake of the plot from Groundhog Day , a man has to repeat Christmas Day over and over until he realizes how selfish he has become and has to change his ways. In a juvenile reworking of Groundhog Day , a self-centered teenager is forced to relive the same Christmas over and over again after his sister wishes it were Christmas every day.
Two pen pals who have never met, decide to meet up at one of their home towns in Boston during the Christmas holiday. Only one problem though, they have both sent pictures of their better looking friends to each other. In rural Cannan, Texas a clash of classmates, one a tough farm boy, the other a bright bookish black boy evokes an unlikely friendship.
It's amidst the magic of Christmas the boys learn about family, hope and love despite living in the shadow of racism. Followed by the sequel Christmas Comes Home to Canaan. Both starring Billy Ray Cyrus. Neighbors along a quaint street in Cleveland suspend their annual Christmas tradition of lighting luminaria, out of respect for their neighbors whose son desperately needs a heart transplant. A donor is found but a blizzard threatens the heart's delivery. A woman shares an impulsive elevator kiss with a handsome stranger, who turns out to be her boss's boyfriend.
They start to care for each other as Christmas approaches. Christmas Lilies of the Field. Seasonal sequel to the theatrical film Lilies of the Field has its African-American protagonist returning to the chapel he had built in the Arizona desert for a group of German nuns. A woman makes a list of things she wants for Christmas and learns the lesson, "Be careful what you wish for. Award-winning adaptation of Truman Capote's poignant, nostalgic reminiscence about his childhood best friend — a childlike elderly relative with whom he makes fruitcakes and other gifts, in Depression-era Alabama.
A story about a friendship between a boy, Buddy, and his older cousin, Sook, during Christmas time. Christmas Miracle in Caufield, U. The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey. A bereaved boy and his widowed mother commission a grumpy woodcarver to carve a nativity set and thus form a relationship that enables them all to put their sadness behind them and move on. A reclusive workaholic, estranged from her mother for ten years, learns after her death that she has an older sibling who was given up for adoption. Though reluctant, she searches for her sibling with the help of her neighbor a military spouse who returned home while her husband recovers overseas from a combat injury; their son wants nothing more but for his dad to be home for Christmas.
A Christmas to Remember. A successful, yet stressed, host of a cooking show is injured while traveling to a remote mountain chalet on vacation. Discovered by a widower with three young children, she has developed retrograde amnesia and does not know who she is. The Christmas Secret aka Flight of the Reindeer. A scientist sets out to prove that reindeer can fly, and along the way discovers the true meaning of faith, family, and Christmas.
Trio of interlocking stories, adopted from the hit song of the same name. A widowed mother struggles to prevent her candy shop from being put out of business by a hard-hearted businessman. A woman must face the hurts of her past while trapped with two strangers in her house for Christmas. Now-teenaged Ralphie Parker schemes to acquire a car for Christmas in this sequel to the theatrical film. A single mom visits her estranged father for Christmas, and is surprised to discover his hometown oddly resembles the North Pole.
An elderly nun, who's been growing an evergreen tree for decades, forms a bond with a gardener who wants to fell it and display it at New York's Rockefeller Center for the holidays. A Christmas Tree Miracle. A family hasn't celebrated Christmas since their son died on Christmas Day serving in the Gulf War , but end up doing so after meeting "Matthew", a hitchhiker who claimed to know their son while deployed.
A businessman tries to uncover a family secret for his grandmother after he returns to a small town to modernize his family's real-estate company. Christmas with a Capital C. Traumatized by her mother's death, a 6-year-old girl stops talking but is cared for by her three uncles. The story unfolds as all of them find the importance of family. A Christmas Without Snow. Clarence Odbody tries to help a young mother who is about to commit suicide.
A young Latina in East Los Angeles meets an African-American Lowrider, and struggles to reconcile her faith and blossoming love affair while becoming dangerously involved in a religious attempt to clone Jesus. A Dennis the Menace Christmas. Dennis tries to inject his grinchy neighbor Mr. A Dog Named Christmas. The Dog Who Saved Christmas. Made by Lifetime Television, this retelling of Dickens' A Christmas Carol features Susan Lucci in the title role of Elizabeth Scrooge, a hard-driven department store owner with no compassion and no time for Christmas joy until she receives a visit from three Christmas spirits.
All the major male roles in this version have been changed to female characters.
Six-year-old Eloise has various adventures at the Plaza Hotel prior to the holiday, in this adaptation of Kay Thompson's book. Aspiring musician Evie Lee must return home to save the family's Christmas Tree farm and decide what's most important in life. A Fairly Odd Christmas. A woman and a photojournalist try to track down a mysterious Christmas hero with the help of an angel.
A dying man attempts to reconcile with the family he had abandoned years earlier, by having them come to visit for Christmas. Good Luck Charlie, It's Christmas! A Grandpa for Christmas. The Greatest Store in the World. A family lose their home at Christmas and in desperation, stay in a department store over the Christmas period.
Grumpy Cat's Worst Christmas Ever. The Heart of Christmas. The Lockes are devastated when they learn their young son Dax has cancer. But with courage, determination and faith, they give Dax one last Christmas, even if it's in October.
Hank Zipzer and the Christmas Catastrophe. It is Christmas and the Zipzer family are preparing for a new baby. Mr Joy hates Christmas and wants to cancel it altogether but Hank causes a Christmas catastrophe. His catastrophe causing leads to his friends being arrested, and a Christmas tree nearly gets plummeted into a crowd.
But will everything go to plan before Hank's new baby brother is born? His and Her Christmas. Rival newspaper columnists battle it out one to save his career advancement at a major newspaper, the other to save the small community newspaper who is her employer before finding romance. It's Hogswatch on the Discworld and the Hogfather has gone missing, requiring Death to take his place while his granddaughter Susan endeavors to find out what has happened.
A struggling artist working as waitress kidnaps one of her customers to bring home and meet her parents at Christmas. A hard school administrator comes to town to close down the school and falls for the charming school music teacher. A Holiday to Remember. Carolyn is leaving the big city with her daughter Jordi for her childhood village, deep in the forest. A made-for-TV sequel to theatrical original. On Christmas Eve in , the Walton family of rural Virginia awaits the return of the family patriarch who went to look for work in a distant city.
This television film led to The Waltons television series. Home for the Holidays. Four sisters return home to visit their father for Christmas, only to discover that someone is trying to kill him. The House Without a Christmas Tree. A widower, still grieving from his wife's death, refuses to allow a Christmas tree in the home, to the dismay of his young daughter. A Scrooge-like book editor is visited by her inner child, who tries to help rekindle her sense of joy during the holidays.
An aging Santa Claus struggles to prepare his cynical would-be successor to take over the job in time for Christmas. When a young boy catches his mom kissing Santa, he decides to be as naughty as he can until he drives Santa back to the North Pole. It Came Upon the Midnight Clear. After suffering a fatal heart attack, a man Mickey Rooney is granted a brief return to life so that he can show his California-bred grandson Scott Grimes his first white Christmas in New York. It Happened One Christmas. A young businesswoman, despondent over the circumstances of her life, contemplates suicide, but is shown the value of her life by a guardian angel, in this feminist remake of It's a Wonderful Life starring the then recently liberated Marlo Thomas.
A modern "Christmas Carol" adaptation in which the ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future mistakenly visit the neighbor of the man they were supposed to teach to love Christmas. Like Father, Like Santa. A ruthless toy tycoon who is also secretly the son of Santa Claus travels to the North Pole to put an end to an attempted coup. Love You Like Christmas. A successful advertising executive, on a cross-country trip to attend a client's wedding, is stranded in Christmas Valley, Ohio, a town in love with Christmas.
But her son, needing math tutoring, makes friends with a man from Maggie's past.
This is a list of Christmas-themed films. Contents. 1 Theatrical; 2 Made-for- television and . A Christmas Story, , Ralphie has to convince his parents, teachers, and that plans to auction off the toys to the highest bidder, and to find their true . The Angel of Pennsylvania Avenue, , In , three children travel to. Home > Christmas Ideas and Traditions > Every Christmas movie EVER bahana-line.com, almost! Trap for Santa Claus, A () – The children set a trap for Santa Claus on Christmas Eve. ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas () – A boy rides in Santa’s sleigh on Christmas Eve.
The Man in the Santa Claus Suit. The lives of three different men are transformed by a magical Santa Claus costume rented to them by a mysterious shopkeeper. The Man Who Saved Christmas. Fact-based drama of toy inventor A. Gilbert, a pacifist toymaker who is forced by the U. A young girl helps the monsters from her storybook defeat an evil witch that has stolen their voices because they sang better at Christmas carols than she did.
The Most Wonderful Time of the Year. An aging Santa Claus is ready to retire but first he must convince his son to take over his job. Santa must pass his powers on to his chosen successor, but mistakenly passes them on to an ex con. The son of Santa Claus woos a single mom while masquerading as an ordinary man and working as a mall Santa. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation 2: Cousin Eddie's Island Adventure.
Cousin Eddie and his family get stranded on what they think is a deserted island for Christmas in this sequel to the theatrical film. He and his father end up driving the Tree throughout the country and the tree become a national icon. A Chicago sports radio shock jock is changed by a Christmas season encounter with a year-old fan who is dying of cancer who forces him to be nice for a day. A woman finds herself in the possession of Santa's "Naughty or Nice book" and uses it for her own advantage.
The Night They Saved Christmas. An oil company dynamites in the North Pole in search of an oil field, unaware that they are endangering Santa Claus. A young boy and his new friend Clementine try to bring back the happiness of Christmas before it's too late. A ballerina is unable to perform in her dream role as The Sugar Plum Fairy due to the sudden death of her sister, which left her as her niece's guardian. Her niece becomes a ballerina herself and is invited to play Clara; the theater director is her aunt's former boyfriend who was to play the Prince in her aunt's performance.
Once Upon a Christmas. Santa's daughter tries to change a family so they are no longer on the Naughty list, or else Santa will cancel Christmas. Strangers get struck in a cottage during a snowstorm and realize they are drawn together. Starring Julie Andrews and James Garner. On the 2nd Day of Christmas.
With the holidays so near, Bert, a store employee, agrees to be responsible for the pair so that Patsy need not spend the holidays in social services. John Candy left and Steve Martin play two mismatched travelers just trying to get to Chicago, and driving each other nuts en route.
The clever turn of phrase in the title is as follows: Such is the fate that befalls inattentive father Scott Calvin Tim Allen, left as he undergoes the transformation. This TV special has actually been made twice, and But a little boy helps him recapture the Christmas spirit. The title says it all. Billy Bob Thornton is perhaps the naughtiest Kris Kringle ever portrayed on screen — a drunken robber set on looting a department store. Bruce Willis plays a New York City detective who just wants to enjoy a Christmas party with his family. Of course, a few terrorists throw a wrench in the plan.
Will he save the hostages — and Christmas? Did someone say dance off? The magic of the Christmas season is discovered as a train ushers children to the North Pole to see Santa and, for some strange reason, Steven Tyler of Aerosmith.
Everyone knows the song, or at least part of it. But this TV special is almost as ubiquitous. Who else but Jim Carrey right could play the Grinch from Dr. Grinch always gets the star treatment as he sets his sights on destroying Christmas for the neighboring village. Both films have been reproduced in various forms, but these versions are widely considered the definitive representations.