Christmas Lights (2009)
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This year Christmas with the Whitfields promises to be one they will never forget. All the siblings have come home for the first time in years and they've brought plenty of baggage with them. As the Christmas tree is trimmed and the lights are hung, secrets are revealed and family bonds are tested. As their lives converge, they join together and help each other discover the true meaning of family.
In this modern take on Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol," Frank Cross (Bill Murray) is a wildly successful television executive whose cold ambition and curmudgeonly nature has driven away the love of his life, Claire Phillips (Karen Allen). But after firing a staff member, Eliot Loudermilk (Bobcat Goldthwait), on Christmas Eve, Frank is visited by a series of ghosts who give him a chance to re-evaluate his actions and right the wrongs of his past.
A retelling of the classic Dickens tale of Ebenezer Scrooge, miser extraordinaire. He is held accountable for his dastardly ways during night-time visitations by the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and future.
Brad and Kate have made something of an art form out of avoiding their families during the holidays, but this year their foolproof plan is about go bust -- big time. Stuck at the city airport after all departing flights are canceled, the couple is embarrassed to see their ruse exposed to the world by an overzealous television reporter. Now, Brad and Kate are left with precious little choice other than to swallow their pride and suffer the rounds.
Madea dispenses her unique form of holiday spirit on rural town when she's coaxed into helping a friend pay her daughter a surprise visit in the country for Christmas.
Follows seemingly unrelated people as their lives begin to intertwine while they fall in, and out, of love. Affections languish and develop as Christmas draws near.
Based on the New York Times best-selling novel by award winning author Wally Lamb. A vivid slice of 1960s life, Wishin' and Hopin' is a wise-and-witty holiday tale that celebrates where we've been-and how far we've come. In the small town of Three Rivers, Connecticut, we go straight into the halls of St. Aloysius Gonzaga Parochial School with Felix Funicello, a Catholic school fifth-grader in 1964, whose claim to fame is his cousin Annette Funicello, the famous Mouseketeer and teen movie queen. But grammar and arithmetic move to the back burner this holiday season with the sudden arrivals of substitute teacher Madame Frechette and feisty Russian student Zhenya Kabakova. While Felix learns the meaning of French kissing, cultural misunderstanding, and tableaux vivants, Wishin' and Hopin' barrels toward one outrageous Christmas!
When their regal matriarch falls ill, the troubled Vuillard family come together for a hesitant Christmastime reunion. Among them is rebellious ne'er-do-well Henri and the uptight Elizabeth. Together under the same roof for the first time in many years, their intricate, long denied resentments and yearnings emerge again.
An old man who hates Christmas is taught the true meaning and spirit of Christmas by ghosts who show him his own past and present. He is also shown what the future holds for him if he doesn't change his behavior.
A father, who can't keep his promises, dies in a car accident. One year later, he returns as a snowman, who has the final chance to put things right with his son before he is gone forever.
Scott Calvin is an ordinary man, who accidentally causes Santa Claus to fall from his roof on Christmas Eve and is knocked unconscious. When he and his young son finish Santa's trip and deliveries, they go to the North Pole, where Scott learns he must become the new Santa and convince those he loves that he is indeed, Father Christmas.
The events focus around a crisis hotline business on one crazy night during the Christmas holidays.
Set in New York City, the film follows a naive fashion school graduate named Lily who finds her world turned upside down when her reckless best friend Kat announces sheâs moving away to London in a matter of days. At a Lower East Side art opening the next night, they meet the enigmatic rising artist Henri, who Lily quickly takes a liking for. With less than seven days left and a new attractor between them, Lily and Kat will find their âunbreakableâ friendship put to the test.
A miserable conman and his partner pose as Santa and his Little Helper to rob department stores on Christmas Eve. But they run into problems when the conman befriends a troubled kid, and the security boss discovers the plot.
Fred Claus (Vince Vaughn) and Santa Claus (Paul Giamatti) have been estranged brothers for many years. Now Fred must reconcile his differences with his brother whom he believes over shadows him. When an efficiency expert (Kevin Spacey) asseses the workings at the North Pole and threatens to shut Santa down, Fred must help his brother to save Christmas.
An uptight, conservative, businesswoman accompanies her boyfriend to his eccentric and outgoing family's annual Christmas celebration and finds that she's a fish out of water in their free-spirited way of life.
A Grinch-like thief retreats to her hometown in Connecticut after a con goes bad and gets stuck baby-sitting her niece and nephew until their parents can make it home for Christmas. She spends most of her time devising ways to even the score with Clive, her partner in crime, until the spirit of the holidays can help put her priorities back on track.
Two New York City children who launch a hilarious scheme to get what they most want this holiday season.
Almost 20 years after the start of the original "Brady Bunch" the kids are grown up and have kids of their own. Everyone is having a wonderful time back at the family house for Christmas, until Mike learns of a structural problem in one of the buildings he designed. As he is inspecting the problem, the building collapses, trapping him inside. As the whole family waits by the pile of rubble, they fear the worst. Will Dad be all right?
Santa's first born daughter, Rudolfa, is secretly selling pieces of the North Pole, and eventually take over where she attempts to ruin Christmas, and replace Santa's workshop with a brand new casino. But Santa's lost daughter Kristin returns to the North Pole with her two children who are desperate to save Christmas, and rebuild the shattered village.
Two families disembark on a cruise to San Juan in celebration of Christmas.
The "magic" in One Magic Christmas is often (and surprisingly) of the "black" variety. Like Jimmy Stewart before her, worn-out wife and mother Mary Steenburgen wishes that she'd never been born. And like Stewart, Steenburgen is visited by a guardian angel, in this case the western-garbed Harry Dean Stanton. Instead of granting Steenburgen's wish, Stanton shows her what life would be like without Christmas--and that vision is as grim as anything you're ever likely to see in any Holiday film. Throughout the horrendous tragedies heaped upon Steenburgen, we are comforted in the knowledge that Stanton is working in concert with Steenburgen's young daughter. Steenburgen learns her lesson of course, but what a ride!
Miser Ebenezer Scrooge is awakened on Christmas Eve by spirits who reveal to him his own miserable existence, what opportunities he wasted in his youth, his current cruelties, and the dire fate that awaits him if he does not change his ways. Scrooge is faced with his own story of growing bitterness and meanness, and must decide what his own future will hold: death or redemption.
As a child, Michael Walker wished every day could be Christmas. That is, until a tragic accident crushed his holiday spirit. Thirty years later, Michael still can't muster any joy for the holidays, despite encouragement from his playful wife and well-intentioned parents. But when his young son faces a tragedy, Michael needs to make amends with his past. A mysterious man named Nick gives Michael a gift and instills in him the courage to find the joy that he lost.
Duncan Mayor decides the perfect Christmas present for his beloved wife, Suzy, is a ride on a real Ferris wheel, set up in their very own back yard. As a young man, it was the perfect place for a wedding proposal. Now, years later, in order to relive the experience with his wife, Duncan will go to any length to make their fantasy become a reality.
A girl calls on her brother's imaginary friend to banish a mischievous boogeyman who has framed her for his pranks.
Joy Robertson goes "on strike for Christmas" because her husband and sons are wrapped up in their own pursuits and providing no help whatsoever with the many Christmas preparations.
13-year-old Monica leads a street life, making her living by selling flowers to couples in local nightspots, she is joined by 10-year-old Andrea who runs out of her house after her mother beats her.
Inspired by the picturesque paintings of Thomas Kinkade, The Christmas Cottage tells the semi-autobiographical tale of how a young boy is propelled to launch a career as an artist after he learns that his mother is in danger of losing the family home.
Deep in the heart of the English countryside lies the enchanting village of Gladbury. Legend has it every 25 years an angel visits the village candlemaker and touches a single candle. Whoever lights this candle receives a miracle on Christmas Eve. But in 1890, at the dawn of the electric age, this centuries old legend may come to an end.
An attorney returns to his small home town in Alaska and quickly rocks the boat by getting an injunction against the nativity display tradition and attacking Christmas.
Two separate stories mesh - in the first, a young music teacher, Maggie Andrews, begins dying of a heart condition and her son Nathan tries to get a pair of Christmas shoes for her before she dies. In the second, lawyer Robert Layton and his wife Kate are slowly drifting apart and the matter comes to a head during Christmas when Kate takes over for Maggie for the school choir.
The siblings of the Fitzgerald family must decide if the dad who abandoned them 20 years ago can come home for Christmas. Can the big Irish clan get past their grievances to be a family again?
A psychosomatically deaf, dumb and blind boy becomes a master pinball player and the object of a religious cult.
Documentary-drama recounting the Martian War of 1913 - 1917. Europe was on tenterhooks in the 2nd decade of the 20th century, everyone was expecting a Great War between the major European powers. But then, in 1913, something crashed into the forests of SW Germany. Troops were sent to investigate but were wiped out. Martian fighting machines began making their way across Western Europe and the countries of Europe combined forces to resist them. With aspects taken from "The War of the Worlds" by H.G. Wells and from WWI itself, this dramatisation presents a documentary style look at events as they unfolded and the effect they had of our world today. Lots of references to real events including the mass attacks and defeats as men were thrown against machines on the Western front, the Christmas truce and the Angel of Mons, America's isolationism and late entry into the conflict, the worldwide "Spanish" flu epidemic that killed more people than the war, and many other things.
âA Christmas Tree Miracleâ is a warm-hearted tale that reminds us that in the holiday season, the best gifts in life are the simple ones, and that miracles do happen, if you believe.
Based on the book "Choke" by Diana Lopez. Taryn finds herself gaining much-desired popularity when the charismatic new girl at school claims her as a âbreath sister," teaching Taryn about the Choking Game. Hiding it from her ever-present mother, best friend, and teachers, Taryn sees choking as a way to build self-control and grab an easy high. But, as the stakes are raised through each subsequent âflightâ, Taryn has no idea that she is actually putting her life in extreme danger.
Three recent high school grads -- star athlete Hancock (Jason Gedrick), his cheerleader girlfriend, Mary (Tracy Pollan), and the awkward Senator (Kiefer Sutherland) -- aim to leave their small town behind and realize big dreams, but their idealistic plans collide with life's harsh realities. One of the first-ever entries at the Sundance Film Festival, this drama written and directed by Michael Hoffman illustrates the promise of youth gone awry.
The tight-knit neighbors on Arthur Avenue have proudly lit Christmas luminaries for 40 years, but that long-standing tradition is cancelled this year when Matt Norman (Ty Wood), a teenage boy in the neighborhood, is hospitalized in desperate need of a heart transplant. As his parents Ann (Teri Polo) and Mike (Paul Essiembre) anxiously pray by his bedside, a donor is found, while in Detroit, a mother (Tess Harper) is in anguish at her own sonâs bedside. When Matt's neighbors decide to honor him in the best way they know how, they just might help save his life.
Reginald Owen portrays Charles Dickens' holiday humbug Ebenezer Scrooge, the miser's miser who has a huge change of heart after spirits whisk him into the past, present and future.
Mickey Rooney plays Mike Halligan, a retired cop from Manhattan living in California with his family who decides to show his grandson, who has never seen snow before, what a real white Christmas in New York is like. But he dies from a sudden heart attack in which Halligan makes a deal with the Archangel of Heaven to return to Earth for a week until Christmas and show his grandson the seasonal glories of New York City.
Scrooge is a miserly old businessman in 1840's London. One Christmas Eve he is visited by the ghost of Marley, his dead business partner. Marley foretells that Scrooge will be visited by three spirits, each of whom will attempt to show Scrooge the error of his ways. Will Scrooge reform his ways in time to celebrate Christmas? Written by Mike Konczewski
A young girl named Addie, living in Nebraska in 1946 wants nothing more for the holidays than a Christmas tree, but her widowed father, is bitter and refuses due to events from the family's past.
When Michelle, the CEO of a gaming software company, is attacked in her home by an unknown assailant, she refuses to let it alter her precisely ordered life. She manages crises involving family, all the while becoming engaged in a game of cat and mouse with her stalker.
Every night, in danger of being beheaded, Scheherazade tells King Shahryar unfinished tales to continue them the following night, hence defying his promise of murdering his new wives after their wedding night. Scheherazade tells king Shahryar her stories but these are not those in the book. These are stories based on whatever will be happening in Portugal during the production time of the film. As in the book, these stories will be tragic and comical, with rich and poor, powerless and powerful people, filled with surprising and extraordinary events. This film will be about the reality of a disgraced country, Portugal, under the effects of a global economic crisis.
While staying at a picturesque village, a teen encounters the underground world of art forgery.
Things go awry when an author and his wife welcome a pregnant woman into their home, with plans to adopt her baby.
When a man is diagnosed with terminal cancer, he takes custody of his misanthropic teenage son, for whom quality time means getting high, engaging in small-time prostitution, and avoiding his father.
Ebeneezer Scrooge (Alastair Sim) contentedly meanders through his life as a cruel miser until one fateful Christmas Eve when he is visited by three ghosts. The spirits show him how his behavior over the years has made him a lonely, bitter old man, and how his heart has grown colder. Using events from Scrooge's idealistic past, dreary present and dismal future, the apparitions try their best to melt his steely soul. Tightfisted Ebeneezer Scrooge learns the error of his ways through the intervention of the ghost of his former partner and of the three spirits and, just in time for the holidays, manages to make everyone's lives a little brighter, his included!
Maria, whose parents live in the country, cannot stand her father's authoritarian ways and moves to the city. She finds a job as a cleaner and tries to survive in a wretched apartment in the shabby part of a big city. She is pregnant, and the fact that her boyfriend has abandoned her does not help matters. When her father goes to the hospital for an operation, her mother comes to stay with her. Her neighbor, an old recluse whose only friend is his dog, begins to come out of his shell and these three lost souls try to give each other the strength to start over.
Mary Murdock, a college student, thinks she's hit and killed a cat with her car driving home drunk from a party. She is horrified beyond words when she gets home and discovers a man's nearly dead body impaled on the bumper of her Jeep. Terrified and irrational, Mary is faced with a series of decisions that determine her fate.
A teenager has his Sitka Spruce tree chosen to be planted outside the White House as the new national Christmas Tree.
In 1942 British soldier Jack Celliers comes to a japanese prison camp. The camp is run by Yonoi, who has a firm belief in discipline, honour and glory. In his view, the allied prisoners are cowards when they chose to surrender instead of commiting suicide. One of the prisoners, interpreter John Lawrence, tries to explain the japanese way of thinking, but is considered a traitor.
For Kathleen, Christmas has always been an unwelcome reminder of her fatherâs abandonment almost 30 years ago. Although she has tried to forget her past, it has not forgotten her. In the days leading up to Christmas un unforgiving blizzard traps her in her own home with two unlikely roommates. Same, a gentle older man Kathleen took in for the night and Lucy, the daughter of her soon to be fiancé bring her face to face with the hurts of her past. Will she be able to let go and grab hold of a life-changing forgiveness or will she continue to be haunted by the pain of the past?
In Depression-era New England, a miserly businessman named Benedict Slade receives a long-overdue attitude adjustment one Christmas eve when he is visited by three ghostly figures who resemble three of the people whose possessions Slade had seized to collect on unpaid loans. Assuming the roles of the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future from Charles Dickens' classic story, the three apparitions force Slade to face the consequences of his skinflint ways, and he becomes a caring, generous, amiable man.
Alfred Carlton Gilbert invented the Erector Set and is trying to get it onto the toy shelves of the country. A.C. is startled to be summoned to the White House, where top officials ask him to convert the toy factory into a weapons manufacturing company for the duration of the war. "No" is really not an option, for fear of being labeled unpatriotic so the switch is made. Later, government officials ask A.C. to be their spokesman for a campaign to avoid "toy giving" for the coming holidays and buy war bonds instead. With a young son himself, who looks forward to Christmas like any other child, what will A.C. do this time?
With the threat of having to close her father's candy store, Wendy and her six-year-old daughter Grace travel to the big city in hopes of making extra holiday cash to save the store. When she's offered a job in the toy department of Wolmans, the city's biggest department store, Wendy can't wait! Her excitement doesn't last long when the store's manager, Teanna, destroys the Christmas spirit throughout the store and replaces Santa with a hunky male underwear model surrounded by elfin "babes." What Teanna is unaware of is that she has in fact sacked the real Santa. Unaware of his real "Santa" status, Wendy reaches out to the old man but it seems even he has given up hope. With her daughter losing faith in the holiday, Wendy realizes she must bring the true meaning of Christmas back to Wolmans before it is too late.
Zeus, a Labrador Retriever and a former police dog (voiced by Mario López), has lost his bark after his barking ended up blowing off a five-year investigation and his partner can't shoot straight again and ends up at the pound. He is adopted by a father (played by Gary Valentine) as both an early Christmas present and as a good guard dog for the house, but the mom (played by Elisa Donovan) is hesitant.
When Charlie Brown complains about the overwhelming materialism that he sees amongst everyone during the Christmas season, Lucy suggests that he become director of the school Christmas pageant. Charlie Brown accepts, but is a frustrating struggle. When an attempt to restore the proper spirit with a forlorn little fir Christmas tree fails, he needs Linus' help to learn the meaning of Christmas.
A snowstorm leaves everyone in the House of Mouse stranded and "bah-humbug" Donald doesn't have any Christmas spirit. Mickey and all the other guests get hot chocolate and cookies to make Donald feel his Christmas spirit.
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