The best Christmas movies on Disney+ to watch this season

Disney recently released its own reboot of the home-invasion series, Home Sweet Home Alone, but the streaming service is also home to the Macaulay Culkin classic (and its less-than-stellar sequels). It’s the holly-jolliest film about child neglect ever made!

For all the nightmarish Halloween chaos – Danny Elfman’s opening track is inarguably the best All Hallows song ever written – this macabre stop-motion treat takes its holiday spirit very seriously too (‘What’s This’ deserves a spot on any Christmas playlist). Sure, the amateur elves of Halloween Town botch the big day by delivering heads and snakes to unsuspecting kids, but it’s the thought that counts, right?

It’s pretty much exactly what the title implies: the immortal Charles Dickens story, as interpreted by Jim Henson’s daffy felt children. Although it was released during a rather down period for the Muppets, it’s still among the most entertaining versions of the tale. That’s thanks in large part to the brilliant Michael Caine – the lone human in the cast – portraying one of the Scroogiest Scrooges to ever bah humbug.

It sounds like a Cronenbergian body-horror film: a mild-mannered grump (Tim Allen) accidentally causes Santa’s death, only to find himself suddenly gaining weight and sprouting hair as he magically becomes the new boss of the North Pole against his will. Yet The Santa Clause is a ‘90s kid classic thanks to its big heart, inherent silliness and overall cheer. Just ignore those lump-of-coal sequels. 

The ultimate in cuddly Christmas afternoon movies, this original stars Edmund Gwenn as Kris Kringle, who must prove he is in fact Santa Claus – not least to a young girl (Natalie Wood) who has lost the true meaning of Christmas. As a bonus, the better-than-expected 1994 remake with Richard Attenborough in the red suit is also available to stream. 

It’s really more of a ‘winter movie’ than a ‘Christmas movie’, and it’s not like your kids need an excuse to put it on, but the joy of watching Princess Anna’s adventure through the icy hinterlands of Arendelle is only enhanced when there are stockings hanging over the fireplace and maybe some actual snow falling outside. If you require something a little more holiday-specific, there’s also the spinoff short Olaf’s Frozen Adventure, in which wisecracking snowman Olaf quite literally learns the reasons for the season.  

While the film takes a few liberties – we’re pretty sure Dickens never wrote about a shrunken Scrooge surfing on an icicle – technical wizard Robert Zemeckis’s motion-capture animated spectacle manages to keep the spirit of the source material intact, with Jim Carrey capably pulling quadruple duty as the world’s most famous miser and all three ghosts of Christmas. It’s a dazzler that doesn’t pull punches when it’s time for the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come to execute the world’s most effective ‘scared straight’ program. 

Victor Herbert’s turn-of-the-century operetta had already been adapted to screen a few times prior to Disney’s take, and has been remade since. But if this isn’t the definitive version, it’s certainly the most extravagant. The plot is a bit all over the place, but all you really need to know is you’ve got Annette Funicello singing and dancing with the kooky residents of Toyland as Christmas approaches.    

It might be better known these days for SNL’s classic ‘Lazy Sunday’ skit (‘Pass the chronic – what? – cles of Narnia’), but this snowy Christmas treat based on CS Lewis’s novel is, indeed, a dreamworld of magic. There’s both a Father Christmas and a White Witch, the latter played by Tilda Swinton.

Tim Allen isn’t the only Home Improvement star who parlayed sitcom success into a big-screen Christmas vehicle. In this family-friendly road-trip comedy, Jonathan Taylor Thomas – the Timothée Chalamet of the ’90s – is a preppy college kid lured home for the holidays by the promise of receiving his father’s Porsche as a gift. But after getting pranked by some jocks and abandoned in the California desert without a wallet, he must figure out how to make the cross-country trip in time to claim his prize – and stop his girlfriend (Jessica Biel) from hooking up with his arch enemy. 

Look, if we’re going to count Die Hard as a Christmas movie, then we’re counting this timeless love story about two dogs learning the value of selflessness and snuggling. Plus, it begins with a lengthy Christmastime sequence and ends with a litter of puppies underneath the tree. Which is to say: Yippie-kay-yay, Bella Notte. 

A movie that acknowledges the true meaning of Christmas – crass consumerism – and mines it for all the goofy humour its premise can muster, this retroactively classic comedy pits Arnold Schwarzenegger against Sinbad as desperate dads hoping to score their respective kids the most coveted gift of the season: a Turbo Man action figure. It’s unapologetically dumb, but if we’re being honest, so are a lot of things about this holiday we love so much, which makes it a great bonding experience for the whole family.

Sandra Bullock is at her most loveable in this smart, thoughtful romcom about a lonely Chicago subway worker who rescues the man of her dreams from an oncoming train only to fall in love with his bad-tempered brother. Witty, sweet and festive – if a little stalkery – it’s the kind of movie Hollywood has always excelled at.

Lethal Weapon and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang scribe Shane Black is the king of the Christmas-set action movie, and his entry in the MCU is no exception. If you’ve ever wanted to watch Robert Downey Jr spend the holidays with an oversized teddy bear and save the world from certain doom while going full George Bailey during an identity crisis, here’s your dream movie. Throw in a detour to the Miss Chattanooga Christmas Pageant and you’ve got a stealthily cheery superhero Christmas-adjacent extravaganza.

An old-school Disney live-action comedy in the spirit of The Santa Clause, this holiday flick was one of Disney+’s banner offerings upon launch, then quickly forgotten. Shame too: Anna Kendrick is perfectly at place as Santa’s overlooked daughter, while Bill Hader is reliably hilarious as the big man’s unwilling heir.