Christmas can be a stressful time. Planning parties, coordinating relatives, and braving over-crowded shopping centers is enough to set anyone on edge. That stress might send some viewers running for the comforting delights of a classic Christmas comedy or a heart-warming holiday romance movie, but sometimes the best way to relieve that tension is to watch someone else do the stressing for couple of hours. After watching some protagonists deal with psychotic slashers or gun-toting terrorists, the in-laws won’t seem so bad.
Holiday thrillers can come in a variety of flavors. Whether it’s the peppermint bite of an erotic mystery or the gingerbread spice of a spy conspiracy, there are enough Christmas films that are equal parts thrills and chills to fill Santa’s sack of gifts. For any viewers looking for Christmas set movies that are guaranteed to get their blood pumping, these ten options provide the perfect white-knuckle sleigh ride.
10 ‘Carry-On’ (2024)
Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra
It’s never too early to celebrate a new Christmas movie. Carry-On stars Taron Egerton as a TSO having the worst Christmas of his life as he’s put into a deadly game of cat and mouse by a very dangerous holiday traveler, played by Jason Bateman. It all amounts to one of Netflix’s most wildly entertaining action thrillers.
Director Jaume Collet-Serra could make this kind of taut thriller in his sleep by now, and he gets a lot of mileage out of the airport setting. Holiday travel usually brings out the worst in people, and Bateman excels when he gets to play a conniving, slithery villain in a psychological thriller. Audiences should skip the holiday trip this year, book a stay-cation and add this solid little thriller to their Netflix cue.
- Release Date
- December 13, 2024
- Cast
- Taron Egerton , Jason Bateman , Sofia Carson , Danielle Deadwyler , Tonatiuh , Theo Rossi , Logan Marshall-Green , Dean Norris , Sinqua Walls , Curtiss Cook , Joe Williamson , Gil Perez-Abraham , Josh Brener , Benito Martinez , Edwin Kho , Reisha Reynolds , Adam Stephenson , Michael Scott , Jeff Pope , Raymond Rehage
- Runtime
- 119 Minutes
9 ‘Better Watch Out’ (2016)
Directed by Chris Peckover
If Kevin McCallister from Home Alone never learned any lessons and aged up into a toxic tween, he’d be something like the central character in Better Watch Out, a twisted home invasion holiday horror movie that would make most babysitters think twice before trying to pick up some extra holiday cash. Levi Miller gives a performance that is as infuriatingly entitled as it is chillingly sadistic.
The film is filled with enough twists to keep viewers on the edge of their seats, and is far more than just the horror version of Home Alone that it was marketed as. Babysitting a bratty kid on Christmas may be no one’s idea of fun, but eating microwave popcorn and streaming Red One would be an absolute delight compared to taking on a sociopath in a Christmas sweater.
- Release Date
- October 6, 2017
- Director
- Chris Peckover
- Runtime
- 89 Minutes
8 ‘Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale’ (2010)
Directed by Jalmari Helander
There have been plenty of killer Santas in movies. Whether supernatural, robotic, or a deranged clown, St. Nick has had his name dragged through the murderous mud plenty. In Rare Exports, an overlooked Finnish horror comedy, a young boy and his hunter father find themselves face to face with a mysterious man they believe may be the real Santa, just in the form of a scrawny naked man who likes to bite ears off.
Before he was killing off Nazis in his bonkers action film Sisu, director Jalmari Helander made this wild original, based on his own short film. It’s the kind of crazy movie that colors well outside the lines, melding genres and tones with abandon. Strap in and hold on for a wild Christmas carnival ride.
Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale
- Release Date
- October 3, 2010
- Director
- Jalmari Helander
- Cast
- Onni Tommila , Jorma Tommila , Per Christian Ellefsen , Tommi Korpela , Rauno Juvonen
- Runtime
- 82 Minutes
7 ‘Three Days of the Condor’ (1975)
Directed by Sydney Pollack
‘Tis the season for cloaks and daggers. Three Days of the Condor is one of the best conspiracy thrillers of the 20th century, as well as a cold-blooded Christmas movie, as Robert Redford’s bookish CIA analyst goes on the run through the holidays after his entire New York office is murdered.
Redford is great in this kind of everyman role, and he has crackling chemistry alongside Faye Dunaway as his unwitting accomplice, along with Max Von Sydow as an ice-cold assassin. Sydney Pollack directs the film with a post-Watergate paranoia, and the New York City setting adds a perfectly chilly atmosphere. Watch this alongside Enemy of the State for a double feature of Christmas conspiracy thrillers.
- Release Date
- September 25, 1975
- Director
- Sydney Pollack
- Runtime
- 118m
Three Days of the Condor is available to rent on Prime Video in the U.S.
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6 ‘The Long Kiss Goodnight’ (1996)
Directed by Renny Harlin
Uninvited Christmas guests can be a major inconvenience, especially when they come bearing guns instead of gifts along with thoughts of revenge. That’s the predicament facing Geena Davis in the criminally overlooked action movie The Long Kiss Goodnight. Davis plays a suburban schoolteacher with amnesia, who discovers she has a past as a trained assassin, setting off a chain of ever more explosive events.
Written by the Christmas-obsessed Shane Black, the movie plays like a pulpier, more festive version of The Bourne Identity. Davis is terrific as both the suburbanite mom and her killer alter ego, and she’s got great support in Craig Bierko, Brian Cox, and Samuel L. Jackson, who called his role here as an unscrupulous private investigator his favorite of all time. This is a killer Christmas thriller to remember.
- Release Date
- October 11, 1996
- Director
- Renny Harlin
- Runtime
- 120
5 ‘Black Christmas’ (1974)
Directed by Bob Clark
A slasher for Christmas is a surefire way to get one’s pulse racing, and there are several options to choose from. Silent Night, Deadly Night is a cult classic, and Inside gives Christmas a bloody, sinister twist, but for classic thrills, the original Black Christmas can’t be beat. The film follows a group of sorority sisters whose Christmas break is rudely interrupted by an obscene caller, who it turns out has even more murderous intentions for them before the holiday is over.
Before director Bob Clark gifted audiences the perennial Christmas classic A Christmas Story, he told a very different kind with this horror film that was inspired by a chilling true story. With a terrific cast, a surprisingly progressive and feminist screenplay, and a killer who would inspire a generation’s worth of horror villains, this is one Christmas classic guaranteed to make any audience’s skin crawl.
- Release Date
- December 20, 1974
- Director
- Bob Clark
- Cast
- Olivia Hussey , Keir Dullea , Margot Kidder , John Saxon , Andrea Martin , Marian Waldman
- Runtime
- 98 Minutes
4 ‘Eyes Wide Shut’ (1999)
Directed by Stanley Kubrick
Make it a very Stanley Kubrick Christmas with the director’s final film, an erotic thriller about one man’s dark yuletide journey into New York City’s debauched underbelly. Eyes Wide Shut holds the record for the longest continuous film shoot ever, as the ever meticulous director demanded perfection in every frame.
The film has a dreamy, unsettling atmosphere to it, which is amplified by the fact that much of it was shot on sound stages, with highly detailed recreations of New York City streets. The result is an unnerving psychological descent into sexual decadence, climaxing in a masked orgy scene that should make for very awkward family Christmas viewing. If nothing else, this creepy Christmas film is proof that Tom Cruise is more than just an action star.
- Release Date
- July 16, 1999
- Director
- Stanley Kubrick
- Runtime
- 159 minutes
3 ‘On Her Majesty’s Secret Service’ (1969)
Directed by Peter R. Hunt
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, long considered the black sheep of the Bond franchise, has only grown in popularity over the years, and is considered a favorite by many fans. It’s also secretly a Christmas movie. Set high in the Swiss Alps, the film’s snowy atmosphere along with the cheerful Christmas decorations that fill the background in several scenes all offset the tremendous action scenes.
Something about the cold always seems to lend it to spy thrillers, and when it comes to spy thrillers nobody does it better than Bond. Watching the secret agent, played here by George Lazenby, take on his archenemy Blofeld while the film’s bespoke Christmas song plays in the background is a great cure for a holiday hangover after enjoying one too many chilled martinis.
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
- Release Date
- December 12, 1969
- Director
- Peter R. Hunt
- Cast
- George Lazenby , Diana Rigg , Telly Savalas , Gabriele Ferzetti , Ilse Steppat , Angela Scoular
- Runtime
- 142
- Writers
- Simon Raven , Richard Maibaum , Ian Fleming
2 ‘Lethal Weapon’ (1987)
Directed by Richard Donner
The madness of the holidays can make many feel like they’re getting too old for it. They’ll find a simpatico relationship with Danny Glover’s Roger Murtaugh, who was too old for it well before he met Mel Gibson’s wild-eyed Martin Riggs in the most thrilling buddy cop movie ever made, Lethal Weapon. The two leads have Christmas chemistry to spare in this 80s action classic written by Shane Black, naturally, and directed with nerve by Richard Donner.
Bouncing between comedic shenanigans to explosive action sequences to some surprisingly dark character moments, Lethal Weapon offers a fully loaded package of thrills, chills, and chuckles. Christmas is about resolving differences and seeing through petty problems, a lesson that can be well learned by watching one of the best odd couples in action movies.
- Release Date
- March 6, 1987
- Runtime
- 112
- Writers
- Shane Black
- Tagline
- Two cops. Glover carries a weapon…Gibson is one. He’s the only L.A cop registered as a Lethal Weapon.
1 ‘Die Hard’ (1988)
Directed by John McTiernan
It’s just not Christmas until Hans Gruber falls from Nakatomi Plaza. What is there to say about Die Hard that hasn’t already been said? It’s the best Christmas action movie of all time, has one of the most relatable action heroes of the 80s, and a villain performance that is perfect from start to finish.
Often imitated but never duplicated, John McTiernan and Bruce Willis crafted something truly special together when they set out to make a film version of the airport novel Nothing Lasts Forever. A whole lot of pieces had to come together to make this Christmas puzzle turn out right, including the casting of Willis after several other big name actors passed, including Clint Eastwood and Frank Sinatra. That makes Die Hard a thrilling Christmas miracle.
- Release Date
- July 15, 1988
- Runtime
- 132 minutes
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