Christmas movies

What's a 'Christmas movie'? Many struggle with more serious questions about Christmas

What's a 'Christmas movie'? Many struggle with more serious questions about Christmas

This question rocks the Internet year after year: Is "Die Hard" a "Christmas movie"?

How about "Frosty the Snowman," "Home Alone," "Elf" or "A Bad Moms Christmas"? Is "A Christmas Story" really a "Christmas" story? What about those Hallmark Channel visions of romance, complicated families and wall-to-wall holiday decorations?

The answer to these questions, and many others, hinges on how Americans answer another question: What is "Christmas"?

Ask that question to an iPhone and Siri will quote Wikipedia: "Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world."

Most people know that much of the story, according to a new survey by Lifeway Research in Nashville. Nearly 75% of Americans say Jesus was born more than 2,000 years ago in Bethlehem and even more believe that Jesus is the Son of God the Father.

After that, things get fuzzy.

"Lots of people celebrate Christmas, but some have no interest in celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ," said Scott McConnell, executive director of Lifeway. "But even some of the people who do take the Christmas message seriously don't understand what it means. …

"This is a story that hasn't changed for 2,000 years, yet many people struggle to tell the story and get the details right. Many don't know why Jesus was born."

Nine of out 10 adult Americans celebrate Christmas, including many non-Christians, according to this September survey of 1,005 Americans, with participants selected to balance gender, age, region, ethnicity, education and religion. This finding matches earlier research.

While Catholics (99%) and Protestants (97%) are the most likely to celebrate Christmas, 82% of religiously unaffiliated Americans also take part, along with 74% of believers in other religious faiths.

Hollywood, Christmas movies and America's secular Advent

The blitz begins while Jack-O-Lanterns are fresh and Thanksgiving turkeys are still frozen, a manic parade of hip elves, sexy angels, reluctant Santas, wisecracking families, toy-obsessed children and even those Euro-trash terrorists who crash holiday office parties.

Entertainment industry pros still call them "Christmas movies."

While the logic may be circular, a "Christmas movie is a movie that everyone expects to be shown on television during the Christmas season two or three years after it was released and then at Christmas for years and years after that," said entertainment scribe Hank Stuever, author of "Tinsel: A Search for America's Christmas Present."

"It's easy to explain why people think 'Love Actually' is a Christmas movie, or 'Home Alone' is a Christmas movie, or 'Elf' is a Christmas movie. What's hard to explain is why 'Die Hard' as a Christmas movie."

All it takes for a movie to earn this label is few holiday touches.