Throughout many generations, Christmas-themed movies have been consumed by the masses over the holiday season and represent the spirit of the holidays with heartfelt storylines. However, some questions remain. What has made these movies so popular? And what does the future of holiday movies look like for the coming years?

Blockbusters like “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “Miracle on 34th Street” may not be as popular with the younger generation today as they are with older generations, but nevertheless, holiday movies can still resurface certain winter-time memories for any person who has indulged in the festive films before. More recently, rebooted movies like “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” and “Elf” have hit theaters in an attempt to modernize the film quality. These reboots are watched every year by younger generations.

However, these movies have yet to make an impact on some Gen X-ers (members of whom were born between 1961 and 1981). On such person is Audio-Visual Production teacher Vanessa Mokry, who still enjoys the older, classic films.

“It’s a Wonderful Life used to run on every single channel, all the time, non stop,” Mokry said. “It was on every day, multiple times a day. Then they changed it so that it would only air once. So now you see it more selectively and it makes it more special.”

Freshman Benjamin Zavadsky said movies that come out during the holidays try to match the season, which makes them easy conversation topics for all age groups. They can also provide an enjoyable outlet for celebrating families to spend and share time with each other. Zavadsky finds that most of his friends watch these holiday films. He also feels that the shared common interest allows connections to be formed.

“When you finally see [the movie], you can bring it up in random conversations and be like ‘yeah I love that movie’ and then you start talking about it and now you have a conversation started,” Zavadsky said. “Since everybody knows about it, everybody watches it and it’s just a bunch of people who’ve watched the same movie and it creates a bond.”

According to movie critic William Poneck, holiday movies tend to have a common theme shared among them. He said that what really draws people in is the endearing story of family and love, and that, unlike non-holiday movies or films meant for other holidays, Christmas movies are meant to be heartwarming and contain an important lesson at the center of the plot.

However, some may find that the plotlines and scripts may seem cheesy or over-hyped and over-used. After all, many of the holiday movies that come out today are either reboots or films with reused character tropes.

“A lot of them are about just being with family and just being good people,” Poneck said. “When they start showing, it just means it’s the start of Christmas and that’s the time of the year we enjoy a lot–not just because of the gifts, but because of being with family.”