Sunday 19 December 2021

The 1980s Greatest Christmas Movies

The Best 1980s Christmas Movies - what's number one from the decade?


What are the best Christmas films of the 1980s? What are your favorites? Scrooged? Gremlins? Die Hard?


Maybe your favorite Christmas movie of the 1980s is Lethal Weapon?



Does Lethal Weapon Meet The Standards Of A Christmas Movie?

Knowing what we know about Die Hard, we can begin to look into just what makes Lethal Weapon a Christmas movie more effectively. Is the film set at Christmas? Like most, if not all of writer Shane Black’s filmography, yes it is. Does the film have a message of selfless devotion to duty and family togetherness? Danny Glover’s Roger Murtaugh exemplifies those values perfectly, and we see that through his relationship with his own family around Christmas time.

But the one big thing that really ties Lethal Weapon into the Christmas movie canon, besides the opening usage of “Jingle Bell Rock,” or even the fact that the film has an action set piece set in the middle of a Christmas tree lot, is Mel Gibson’s Martin Riggs. A suicidal mess who’s a loose cannon, Riggs isn’t exactly the jolliest cop on the LAPD beat when we meet him.

And yet, through the caper that throws him together with Murtaugh as a partner, Riggs goes through a Christmas Carol style journey that helps him become a better man. Making a friend in Roger Murtaugh, Martin Riggs eventually becomes a better person after a harrowing Christmas, and even spends Christmas with the entire Murtaugh family; allowing him to give a symbolic gift that proves he’s a changed man. Does Lethal Weapon meet the standards of a Christmas movie? It absolutely does, and to help prove that fact we have evidence provided by none other than Die Hard writer Steven de Souza, who freely admits that thanks to Lethal Weapon, Die Hard was inspired to become a Christmas classic in the making!

The eighties definitely brought us some of the best Christmas films!

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