10 Underrated Christmas Movies You Need To See

6. Arthur Christmas

Carol 2015
Sony Pictures

Animated films made by third-party companies are rarely given any kind of attention, mostly because they tend to be, well, hot flaming garbage 90% of the time.

But occasionally you get a really good one. Occasionally you get something like Arthur Christmas.

Arthur Christmas is a movie juggling a lot of themes up in the air at once, while also balancing that with being one of the funniest animated comedies ever made. The fact that it pulls off anything it set out to do is an achievement, but that it also succeeds while elevating the craft of animated Christmas movies to a whole new level (not unlike a later entry we'll get to soon) makes the fact that not a lot of people have heard about it or talk about it these days a true tragedy.

Arthur Christmas is hilarious and heartfelt in all the ways a truly great Christmas movie needs to be, bringing the laughs with its mile a minute humor while also spinning a touching thread about generational differences and the need to bridge them to move forward.

Contributor
Contributor

John Tibbetts is a novelist in theory, a Whatculture contributor in practice, and a nerd all around who loves talking about movies, TV, anime, and video games more than he loves breathing. Which might be a problem in the long term, but eh, who can think that far ahead?