20 best movies like A Christmas Story (1983)

List of the best movies like A Christmas Story (1983): Jingle All the Way 2, Christmas Story, A Christmas Carol, It's a Wonderful Life, Nicholas on Holiday, Fred Claus, Santa's Little Helper, Rise of the Guardians, Because of Winn-Dixie, Mon oncle Antoine.

Tags: movies similar to A Christmas Story (1983) - full list

Markimdb: 3.8
Genrecomedy, adventure, family
CountryUSA

Larry's daughter wants only one thing for Christmas - a talking bear. His daughter's step-dad intends to make sure that Larry can't get one.

Markimdb: 7
Genrefantasy, drama, family
CountryFinland
Duration01:23

Hundreds of years ago in Lapland, a little boy named Nikolas loses his family in an accident. The villagers decide to look after the orphaned boy together. Once a year - at Christmas - Nikolas moves to a new home. To show his gratitude, Nikolas decides to make toys for the children of the families as good-bye presents. Over the years, Nikolas's former adoptive families become many, and soon almost every house has presents on its doorstep on Christmas morning. At thirteen, Nikolas is sent to live and work with Iisakki, a grumpy old carpenter, who forbids Nikolas to continue making presents for Christmas. Gradually, however, Nikolas wins Iisakki's trust. Together they begin to look after the Christmas traditional that Nikolas has begun. When the aged Iisakki has to leave Nikolas and move away, the tradition of Christmas presents is once again at risk. Thankfully, Nikolas comes up with a solution that brings children joy every Christmas, even continuing to today.

Markimdb: 7.8
Genrefantasy, drama, family
CountryUnited Kingdom, USA

An old bitter miser who makes excuses for his uncaring nature learns real compassion when three ghosts visit him on Christmas Eve.

Markimdb: 8.6
Genrefantasy, drama, family
CountryUSA
Duration02:10

A holiday favourite for generations... George Bailey has spent his entire life giving to the people of Bedford Falls. All that prevents rich skinflint Mr. Potter from taking over the entire town is George's modest building and loan company. But on Christmas Eve the business's $8,000 is lost and George's troubles begin.

Markimdb: 6.2
Genrecomedy, family
CountryFrance, Belgium
Duration01:37

It's the end of the school year. The long-awaited moment of the holidays is arrive. The little Nicolas, her parents and Grandma take the road towards the sea, and settle in for some time at the Hotel Beau-Rivage.

Markimdb: 5.6
Genrefantasy, comedy, family
CountryUSA
Duration01:56

Fred Claus and Santa Claus have been estranged brothers for many years. Now Fred must reconcile his differences with his brother whom he believes overshadows him. When an efficiency expert assesses the workings at the North Pole and threatens to shut Santa down, Fred must help his brother to save Christmas.

Markimdb: 4.8
Genrecomedy, family
CountryCanada

After getting fired from his job, a slick, fast-talking businessman is thrown into an elf competition to become Santa¹s next second-in-command. Put through a series of rigorous training exercises to prepare for the contest, The Miz and another aspiring elf go head-to-head in the hopes of becoming Santa¹s Little Helper.

Markimdb: 7.3
Genrefantastic, action, fantasy, comedy, drama, adventure, family, cartoon
CountryUSA
Duration01:37

When an evil spirit known as Pitch lays down the gauntlet to take over the world, the immortal Guardians must join forces for the first time to protect the hopes, beliefs and imagination of children all over the world.

Markimdb: 6.4
Genrecomedy, drama, family
CountryUSA
Duration01:46

A girl, abandoned by her mother when she was three, moves to a small town in Florida with her father. There, she adopts an orphaned dog she names Winn-Dixie. The bond between the girl and her special companion brings together the people in a small Florida town and heals her own troubled relationship with her father.

Markimdb: 7.4
Genredrama
CountryCanada

Set in cold rural Quebec at Christmas time, we follow the coming of age of a young boy and the life of his family which owns the town's general store and undertaking business. Mon Oncle Antoine is Director Claude Jutra's masterpiece: A poignant, starkly honest, but humane film, shot through with authenticity from beginning to end. Realized with an unflagging artistic vision, Mon Oncle Antoine poetically portrays a young boy's coming of age, vividly capturing the Quebec mining town in which he lives.

Markimdb: 5.5
Genrecomedy, family, sport
CountryUSA
Duration01:40

In a depressed Texas town, British foreign exchange teacher Anna attempts to inject some life into her hopeless kids by introducing them to soccer. They're terrible at first, but Anna and her football-hero assistant whip them into shape. As they work overtime, the pair help kids build their self-esteem and also get involved in solving family squabbles.

Markimdb: 7.1
Genrecomedy, family, cartoon, anime
CountryJapan

The Yamadas are a typical middle class Japanese family in urban Tokyo and this film shows us a variety of episodes of their lives. With tales that range from the humourous to the heartbreaking, we see this family cope with life's little conflicts, problems and joys in their own way.

Markimdb: 6.5
Genrefantasy, comedy, drama, family
CountryUSA
Duration01:44

Ramona is a little girl with a very big imagination and a nose for mischief. Her playful antics keep everyone in her loving family on their toes, including her older sister Beezus, who's just trying to survive her first year of high school. Through all the ups and downs of childhood, Ramona and Beezus learn that anything's possible when you believe in yourself and rely on each other.

Markimdb: 7.9
Genredrama, family
CountryUnited Kingdom

A young, English working-class boy spends his free time caring for and training his pet falcon.

Markimdb: 6.1
Genrefantasy, melodrama, drama, family
CountryCanada, USA

A successful businesswoman, Mackenzie, inherits her beloved aunt's inn, and chooses to restore the hotel to its original grandeur only to sell it right before Christmas. Unbeknownst to Mackenzie, she receives some unexpected help from a team of elves headed by the cheerful Clementine, who helps Mackenzie rediscover the true meaning of Christmas.

Markimdb: 5.9
Genrecomedy, drama, family
CountryUSA

The tale of a ten-year-old boy in a Catholic school who, following the death of his beloved grandfather, embarks on a quest to discover the meaning of life.

Markimdb: 7.8
Genrecomedy, drama
CountryUSA
Duration01:47

Based on the novel by Truman Capote, this often-witty coming-of-age drama looks at a young man growing up with an unusual family in the Deep South in the 1940s.

Markimdb: 7.3
Genrecomedy, melodrama, drama, family
CountryUSA

Five-time Emmy nominee and Golden Globe winner Henry Winkler stars in The Most Wonderful Time of the Year, the story of what happens when you open your heart to the power of Christmas. Disenchanted single mom Jennifer Cullen (Brooke Burns) is a Scroogette when it comes to anything Christmas. In fact, even her six-year-old son, Brian, is having trouble believing in Santa Claus. But when her Uncle Ralph (Henry Winkler) visits and brings a fellow passenger from his flight named Morgan Derby (Warren Christie), Jennifer s dubious heart awakens to the possibility that perhaps Christmas really does hold miracles. It s uplifting and laugh-packed and a story that will inspire the whole family to believe.

Markimdb: 7.8
Genrefamily, documentary
CountryFrance

The documentary's title translates as "to be and to have", the two auxiliary verbs in the French language. It is about a primary school in the commune of Saint-Étienne-sur-Usson, Puy-de-Dôme, France, the population of which is just over 200. The school has one small class of mixed ages (from four to twelve years), with a dedicated teacher, Georges Lopez, who shows patience and respect for the children as we follow their story through a single school year.

Markimdb: 7.1
Genrecomedy, family
CountryUSA
Duration01:51

When a widower with ten children marries a widow with eight, can the twenty of them ever come together as one big happy family?

Markimdb: 5.6
Genrefantasy, comedy, melodrama, drama
CountryUSA
Duration02:03

Good natured Reverend Henry Biggs finds that his marriage to choir mistress Julia is flagging, due to his constant absence caring for the deprived neighborhood they live in. On top of all this, his church is coming under threat from property developer Joe Hamilton. In desperation, Rev. Biggs prays to God for help - and help arrives in the form of an angel named Dudley.

Markimdb: 6.1
Genremelodrama, drama, family
CountryUSA, Canada

Jackie Foster, a dynamic Assistant District Attorney and single mom, is looking forward to wrapping up her latest case and spending Christmas with Gracie, her adorable and precocious, eight-year old daughter. But when Jackie’s estranged dad, Jack , a gruff retired police officer, unexpectedly shows up at her door, they will be forced to confront old wounds.

Markimdb: 6.9
Genrecomedy, drama, family
CountryFrance, Greece
Duration01:28

After his wife died a man refuses to go out and doesn't want to talk to his only son. Life has no meaning for him. One day his son finds a baby pelican and decides to leave the bird at home. Pelican helps the boy find his father again and revive him back to life ...

Markimdb: 5.8
Genreadventure, family
CountryUSA
Duration01:34

An update of the Lassie legend stars Thomas Guiry as a troubled city kid whose family retreats to the country, where he befriends the famous collie and changes for the better. Conflict develops when a ruthless sheep rancher causes trouble for everyone.

Markimdb: 7.1
Genrefantasy, comedy, adventure, family, cartoon
CountryUnited Kingdom, USA, Republic of Ireland, France, Canada
Duration01:37

Each Christmas, Santa and his vast army of highly trained elves produce gifts and distribute them around the world in one night. However, when one of 600 million children to receive a gift from Santa on Christmas Eve is missed, it is deemed ‘acceptable’ to all but one – Arthur. Arthur Claus is Santa’s misfit son who executes an unauthorized rookie mission to get the last present half way around the globe before dawn on Christmas morning.

Markimdb: 7.8
Genredrama
CountrySpain
Duration01:35

In the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, Ana, a sensitive seven-year-old girl in a rural Spanish hamlet is traumatized after a traveling projectionist screens a print of James Whale's 1931 "Frankenstein" for the village. The youngster is profoundly disturbed by the scenes in which the monster murders the little girl and is later killed himself by the villagers. She questions her sister about the profundities of life and death and believes her older sibling when she tells her that the monster is not dead, but exists as a spirit inhabiting a nearby barn. When a Loyalist soldier, a fugitive from Franco's victorious army, hides out in the barn, Ana crosses from reality into a fantasy world of her own.

Markimdb: 6.4
Genrecomedy, drama, family
CountryUSA
Duration01:30

Teddy Duncan's middle-class family embarks on a road trip from their home in Denver to visit Mrs. Duncans Parents, the Blankenhoopers, in Palm Springs. When they find themselves stranded between Denver and Utah, they try to hitch a ride to Las Vegas with a seemingly normal older couple in a station wagon from Roswell, New Mexico. It turns out that the couple believes they are the victims of alien abduction. The Duncan's must resort to purchasing a clunker Yugo to get to Utah, have their luggage stolen in Las Vegas, and survive a zany Christmas with Grandpa and Grandma Blankenhooper.

Markimdb: 6.7
Genrecomedy, drama
CountryUSA
Duration02:30

A world-weary college professor is given a life-changing diagnosis and decides to throw all pretense and conventions to the wind and live his life as boldly and freely as possible with a biting sense of humor, a reckless streak and a touch of madness.

Markimdb: 7.4
Genredrama, biography, sport
CountryUSA
Duration02:50

    A track coach in a small California town transforms a team of athletes into championship contenders.

    Markimdb: 7.6
    Genredrama, family
    CountryIran
    Duration01:25

    Several people try to take advantage of a little girl's innocence to hustle money her mom gave to her to buy a goldfish with.

    Markimdb: 6.3
    Genrecomedy, drama
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:46

    When Michael McCann is thrown over by the woman he loves, he becomes something of a misanthrope and a miser, spending all of his spare money on collectible gold coins. Living in the same town is an affluent family with two sons: John and Tanny. Tanny's a wild boy, whom John cannot control, and one night he breaks into McCann's house, and steals the gold and disappears, which nearly confirms McCann's distrust of mankind. But then, a mysterious young woman dies in the snow outside McCann's house, and her small daughter makes her way to McCann's house and into McCann's life and heart.

    Markimdb: 5.7
    Genredrama
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:28

    After she and her husband lose their jobs, a former Texas homecoming queen inadvertently finds herself in the middle of a prostitution ring after she unknowingly accepts a position at a massage parlor.

    Markimdb: 5.5
    Genrecomedy, melodrama, drama
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:49

    This is the story of a dysfunctional New York family, and their attempts to reconcile

    Markimdb: 5.2
    Genrecomedy, family
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:36

    Ben Archer is not happy. His mother, Sandy, has just met a man, and it looks like things are pretty serious. Driven by a fear of abandonment, Ben tries anything and everything to ruin the "love bubble" which surrounds his mom. However, after Ben and Jack's experiences in the Indian Guides, the two become much closer.

    Markimdb: 7
    Genredrama
    CountryUnited Kingdom
    Duration01:28

    Urban fairytale set in Manchester. A series of tragic events that blight a young boy's life are reversed one Christmas Eve, giving him and those around him the happy ending that they were destined to have.

    Markimdb: 7.4
    Genredrama, history
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:42

    Based on the Depression-era bildungsroman memoir of writer A. E. Hotchner, the film follows the story of a boy struggling to survive on his own in a hotel in St. Louis after his mother is committed to a sanatorium with tuberculosis. His father, a German immigrant and traveling salesman working for the Hamilton Watch Company, is off on long trips from which the boy cannot be certain he will return.

    Markimdb: 5.6
    Genrecomedy, melodrama
    CountryUSA

    An offbeat romantic comedy about a decent guy, Ray Tuckby, with a dead-end life in the dead-end town of Trona, CA. After encouragement from a stranger whom he happens upon, Ray begins to dream again. He sheds the parasites in his life, musters the nerve to pursue his childhood love, and finally takes back his community by toppling the local teenage Meth-baron.

    Markimdb: 6.7
    Genredrama, family
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:30

    While working on a class assignment to write a paper on “My Impossible Christmas Wish,” Olivia Mead quickly takes note of unusual happenings. As her wishes come true, she is convinced the miracles are linked to a mysterious woman she believes is an angel.

    Markimdb: 6.8
    Genrefantasy, comedy, melodrama, drama
    CountryUSA
    Duration02:05

    Jack's lavish, fast-paced lifestyle changes one Christmas night when he stumbles into a grocery store holdup and disarms the gunman. The next morning he wakes up in bed lying next to Kate, his college sweetheart he left in order to pursue his career, and to the horrifying discovery that his former life no longer exists. As he stumbles through this alternate suburban universe, Jack finds himself at a crossroad where he must choose between his high-power career and the woman he loves.

    Markimdb: 7.2
    Genredrama
    CountryUSA
    Duration02:03

    Like some other kids, 12-year-old Trevor McKinney believed in the goodness of human nature. Like many other kids, he was determined to change the world for the better. Unlike most other kids, he succeeded.

    Markimdb: 6.4
    Genremelodrama, drama
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:50

    In the 1950s, brothers Jacey and Doug Holt, who come from the poorer side of their sleepy Midwestern town, vie for the affections of the wealthy, lovely Abbott sisters. Lady-killer Jacey alternates between Eleanor and Alice, wanting simply to break the hearts of rich young women. But sensitive Doug has a real romance with Pamela, which Jacey and the Abbott patriarch, Lloyd, both frown upon.

    Markimdb: 7
    Genremelodrama, drama
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:50

    A railroad official, Owen Legate comes to Dodson, Mississippi to shut down much of the town's railway (town's main income). Owen unexpectedly finds love with Dodson's flirt and main attraction, Alva Starr. Alva and Owen then try to escape Alva's mother's (Hazel) clutches and the town's revenge.

    Markimdb: 7.6
    Genredrama, family
    CountryUSA

    Welcome to Fuller Junction, Wisconsin, a friendly small town settled by Norwegian farmers. Here we see the exploits of two young cousins, Selma and Arnold, who learn about their world and experience the ups and downs of life as the season pass.

    Markimdb: 5.6
    Genrecomedy
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:38

    TV child star of the '70s, Dickie Roberts is now 35 and parking cars. Craving to regain the spotlight, he auditions for a role of a normal guy, but the director quickly sees he is anything but normal. Desperate to win the part, Dickie hires a family to help him replay his childhood and assume the identity of an average, everyday kid.

    Markimdb: 7.2
    Genrecomedy, drama
    CountrySlovakia, Czech Republic

    The principal of an elementary school calls a special parents meeting after it’s alleged that the seemingly empathetic and kindly-looking teacher Mrs. Drazděchová uses her students to manipulate their parents.

    Markimdb: 6.9
    Genredrama, adventure, family
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:47

    Amy is only 13 years old when her mother is killed. She goes to Canada to live with her father, an eccentric inventor whom she barely knows. Amy is miserable in her new life... until she discovers a nest of goose eggs that were abandoned when a local forest is torn down. The eggs hatch and Amy becomes "Mama Goose". When Winter comes, Amy, and her dad must find a way to lead the birds South...

    Markimdb: 6.2
    Genredrama
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:35

    For three high school friends, growing up takes a dangerous turn when the local bully targets them with his aggression. With no one to turn to but each other, they muster the courage to take a shot at settling the score.

    Markimdb: 5.9
    Genrefantasy, comedy, melodrama, drama, family
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:29

    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.

    Markimdb: 7.1
    Genredrama, family
    CountryUSA, Canada

    After being dumped at the alter on her wedding day, Maggie Conway moves to the island town of Friday Harbor in Washington State, where she meets Mark Nagle, the local coffee shop owner.

    Markimdb: 6.4
    Genrefantasy, melodrama, drama, family
    CountryUSA
    Duration01:51

    Fifteen years ago, Ben Walker made a decision to leave his college sweetheart and ultimately his faith, in order to pursue a lucrative business opportunity. Now with a high-paying career and a trophy fiancé, he is visited by an angel, who gives him a glimpse into what his life would look like had he followed his calling.




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