Simply having a wonderful Christmas time

Christmas is the perfect excuse to curl up on the sofa with a cuppa, an entire tin or two of Quality Street and copious amounts of sentimental schmaltz. Here’s our pick of the best ever accompaniments to overeating and dodgy reindeer jumpers:

Miracle on 34^th Street – We could have gone for either version of this – they’re both smashing – but we decided on the 1994 remake for two reasons. One, our borderline inappropriate love of Richard Attenborough, and two the presence of irritatingly cute child superstar Mara Wilson. So what if it’s sickeningly sweet and the ending is just that bit too happy? It gives us the warm fuzzies. Every. Single. Time. And that’s what Christmas is about, after all.

Well, that and beating up robbers with household appliances. There’s just no way we can make a Christmas list and not include Home Alone (we’ll throw the equally awesome sequel in for good measure). It’s hilarious, it’s clever and it has a badass child lead as well as bucketloads of festive family sentiment. Our personal highlight is a moment in Home Alone 2 that involves a blow up doll, a kite and a shower. Need we say more?

It’s A Wonderful Life is another one it would just be sacrilege to miss out. It’s the ultimate Christmas film and a bona-fide classic. Utterly depressing in parts – suicide not being a common theme for films set in the holiday period – it’s also funny, moving, uplifting and inspirational. If you haven’t seen it, do so right now. Bring tissues, because you will cry. In a good way.

In at number four is Love Actually. Gazillion different storylines aside, at its heart this is a film about spending Christmas with people you love. Awwww. And that placard scene between Andrew Lincoln and Keira Knightley? Wonderful – even if her character is actually married to his character’s BFF. Also involves naked Bill Nighy (if you like that sort of thing).

Last but by no means least, we have A Christmas Carol. There are so many different takes on this story floating about that we won’t pick just one, although the Muppets version is highly recommended solely because it features both musical numbers and Michael Caine. It’s the story itself that matters – a cantankerous old miser is taught the error of his ways and learns to be the nice guy. Epitomises the real spirit of Christmas (giving people stuff, of course!) Lovely jubbly.