griggs's - Decembinge 2024 (Ranked) List

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Divine stars as mean teen Dawn Davenport, who turns to a life of crime when her parents fail to give her the cha-cha heels she wants for Christmas.

With her illegitimate daughter (Mink Stole) and delinquent girlfriends beside her, she becomes a bizarre canvas for the fascist Lipstick Beauty Salon owners (David Lochary, Mary Vivian Pearce). A media star obsessed with the idea that "crime is beauty", her story comes to a shocking conclusion!

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Legendary director Nicholas Ray began his career with this lyrical film noir, the first in a series of existential genre films overflowing with sympathy for America's outcasts and underdogs.

When the wide-eyed fugitive Bowie (Farley Granger), having broken out of prison with some bank robbers, meets the innocent Keechie (Cathy O'Donnell), each recognizes something in the other that no one else ever has. The young lovers envision a new, decent life together, but as they flee the cops and contend with Bowie's fellow outlaws, who aren't about to let him go straight, they realize there's nowhere left to run. Ray brought an outsider's sensibility honed in the theater to this debut, using revolutionary camera techniques and naturalistic performances to craft a profoundly romantic crime drama that paved the way for decades of lovers-on-the-run thrillers to come.

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One of the great American independent films of the 1990's, the surprise hit 'Metropolitan' by writer-director Whit Stillman, is a sparkling comedic chronicle of a middle-class young man's romantic misadventures in New York City's debutante society.

Stillman's deft, literate dialogue and hilariously highbrow observations earned this first film an Academy Award nomination for best original screenplay. Alongside the wit and sophistication, though, lies a tender tale of adolescent anxiety.

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Four months after pregnant Sarah (Alysson Paradis) loses her husband in a horrific auto accident, she is visited on Christmas Eve by a mysterious madwoman. Alone and desperate to save her unborn child, Sarah fights to stay alive as each of her potential rescuers die at the woman's sadistic hands.

With scene after scene of shocking carnage and escalating mayhem, Inside delivers unbelievably realistic gore that dares you not to look away.

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18-year-old check-out girl Ronna (Sarah Palley) is trying to score some rent money before she is evicted on Christmas eve. Accompanied by reluctant partner in crime Claire (Katie Holmes), she embarks on her first drug deal...

Meanwhile, impulsive Brit Simon (Desmond Askew) is driving a stolen car with buddy Marcus (Taye Dlggs) during a no-holds-barred night of partying In Vegas, as Adam (Scott Wolf) and Zack (Jay Mohr) find themselves in the middle of a real-life drug sting - and a very creepy Christmas dinner...

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Adapted by Paul Meyersberg from the novel by Laurens Van der Post, the film is a riveting exploration of racism, brutality and the sparks that fly when cultures collide, concentrating on a war of wills between enigmatic and rebellious POW Jack Celliers (David Bowie) and camp commandant Capt Yonoi

(Ryuichi Sakamoto). Intelligently exploring the psychology of its characters, 'Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence' also hints at a sexual attraction between Celliers and Yonoi, and as such is an audacious and original addition to the POW genre.

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'You've Got Mail' delivers all the wit, charm and warmth you'd expect from a reunion of the stars (Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan) and director (Nora Ephron) of 'Sleepless in Seattle'.

Greg Kinnear, Parker Posey, Dean Stapleton and more talented co-stars add perfect support to this valentine to modern - to modem - romance in which superstore book chain magnate Hanks and cozy children's bookshop owner Ryan are anonymous e-mail cyberpals who fall head-over-laptops in love, unaware they are combative business rivals. You've got rare Hollywood magic when 'You've Got Mail'.

Colin (Neil Maskell) hires a lavish country manor for his extended family to celebrate New Year. Unfortunately for Colin his position of power in the family is under serious threat from the arrival of his estranged brother David.

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Two talented song-and-dance men (Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye) team up after the war to become one of the hottest acts in show business. One winter, they join forces with a sister act (Rosemary Clooney and Vera-Ellen) and trek to Vermont for a white Christmas.

Of course, there's the requisite fun with the ladies, but the real adventure starts when Crosby and Kaye discover that the inn is run by their old army general who's now in financial trouble. And the result is the stuff dreams are made of.

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Judy Garland stars in a timeless tale of family, captured with warmth and emotion by director Vincente Minnelli. The enduring popularity of Meet Me in St Louis comes from a terrific blend of music, romance and humour.

Starring Judy Garland, together with Margaret O'Brien (as 1944's outstanding child actress) and Mary Astor, and featuring the musical classics "Meet Me in St. Louis, Louis", "The Trolley Song" and "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas".

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Written by a discharged journalist as a publicity stunt, and as a parting shot at the paper's new editor, the premise of the letter unexpectedly fires the imagination of the Bulletin's readers and the wider American public.

Its real author, Ann Mitchell (Barbara Stanwyck) who has fabricated the letter in her final column, is rehired, and now needs to find someone to play the part of the fictional "John Doe." Gary Cooper is perfectly cast as Long John Willoughby, an injured and penniless former baseball pitcher lured into impersonating "John Doe" with the promise of medical treatment. In what would have undoubtedly been an Oscar winning performance, were it not for his own success that same year in Howard Hawks' "Sergeant York," Cooper excels himself here as Willoughby's initial indifference to his undertaking turns to genuine concern at his role. But, as he becomes an increasingly culpable pawn in an ever more treacherous game, just how can "John Doe" redeem himself?

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This holiday season Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) vows his clan will enjoy 'the most fun-filled family Christmas ever'. Before you can sing 'Fa-la-la-la-lah', he decks the halls with howls of folly in there perennial favourite National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. Seeing is believing.

There are 25,000 lights on the roof. An exploding turkey on the dining room table. A SWAT team taking siege outside. A festive supporting cast (including Beverly D'Angelo, Randy Quaid, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Juliette Lewis, William Hickey and more). And a John Hughes script full of wit, heart and sheer goofiness. Yule love it!

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"Silent Night" follows parents Nell (Keira Knightley) and Simon (Matthew Goode) who have invited their closest friends to join their family for Christmas dinner at their idyllic home in the English countryside.

As the group comes together, it feels like old times - but behind all of the laughter and merriment, something is not quite right. The world outside is facing impending doom, and no amount of gifts, games or Prosecco can make mankind’s imminent destruction go away. Surviving the holidays just got a lot more complicated.

On Christmas Eve, a family gathers for what could be the last holiday in their ancestral home. As the night wears on and generational tensions arise, one of the teenagers sneaks out with her friends to claim the wintry suburb for her own.

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He's the baddest heeb this side of Tel Aviv. He is... The Hebrew Hammer. Like a badass hybrid of Austin Powers and Shaft, the Hebrew Hammer (Adam Goldberg) is the hilarious hero in the story of one man's fight to save Hanukkah.

The Jewish holiday is in jeopardy as the evil offspring of Santa Claus, Damian (Andy Dick), will do anything to destroy it. With the aid of his 'brother-from-another-mother' Mohammed (Mario Van Peebles) and the delectable and dangerous daughter of the leader of the Jewish Justice, Esther (Judy Greer) he's ready to kick some gentile butt!