List of Holiday Fare Offers Alternatives

You can get that easy dose of seasonal cheer by renting perennial holiday favorites such as “Miracle on 34th Street,” “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “Holiday Inn” and “White Christmas.”

But if your appetite for holiday movies isn’t quite sated by those classics, you might try some movies that aren’t as well known, but nonetheless do provide those pleasing rushes of Christmas warmth.

Here are some suggestions:

“Christmas Lilies of the Field” (MPI Video, 1979). In this sequel, Billy Dee Williams plays that likeable drifter Homer Smith--the role made famous by Sidney Poitier in the 1963 film. A TV movie, it’s as heart-warming as the original, in which Mother Maria coaxes Homer to build a chapel in the Arizona desert. This time the sisters need an orphanage and a kindergarten.

“A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” (Playhouse, 1945). In the middle of this movie, there’s a stark, touching sequence showing what it’s like to celebrate Christmas in poverty. Directed by Elia Kazan, this is a drama about dreams vs. reality in a tenement in turn-of-the-century Brooklyn, focusing on an Irish family headed by a practical mother (Dorothy McGuire) and a father (James Dunn) who’s a drunken dreamer. When they clash, their young daughter (Peggy Ann Garner) is caught in the middle.

“Christmas in Connecticut” (MGM/UA, 1945). There’s an abundance of Christmas cheer in this tangled tale of a magazine columnist (Barbara Stanwyck) who writes about food, farm life and marriage, though ignorant of all three. To salvage her job, she has to orchestrate a homey Christmas in Connecticut for her boss and a war veteran (Dennis Morgan). Of course, she falls for the veteran.

“The Shop Around the Corner” (MGM/UA, 1940). Set during the Christmas season, this romantic Ernst Lubitsch comedy is about two co-workers in a notions shop who don’t like each other but don’t realize that, as anonymous pen pals, they’re falling in love.

“One Magic Christmas” (Disney, 1985). People who lose the holiday spirit in Christmas movies always miraculously regain it--and it’s fun watching the process. In this one, a stressed-out mother (Mary Steenburgen) is too burdened by problems to be concerned with Christmas. But her 6-year-old daughter eventually salvages Mom’s spirit, with the help of a weird guardian angel played by Harry Dean Stanton.

Four notable versions of Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol”:

“Scrooge” (CBS-Fox, 1970). This musical treatment of “A Christmas Carol” is short on memorable music (Leslie Bricusse wrote the so-so score) but long on holiday cheer. If you like Christmas ham, you’ll love Albert Finney’s pleasantly overripe acting as Scrooge. Alec Guinness gives a showy, scene-stealing performance as Marley’s ghost.

“Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol” (Paramount, 1962). An animated, musical version of Dickens’ tale with nearsighted Mr. Magoo (the voice of Jim Backus) as Scrooge. It’s one of the most delightful--and ignored--of all holiday cartoons.

“A Christmas Carol” (United Home Video, 1951). Of all the films of the Scrooge story, this one, featuring Alistair Sim in the title role, is by far the best. In one of the great, unsung performances, Sim turns Scrooge--a cardboard stereotype in the other movies--into a complex, multilayered character.

“An American Christmas Carol” (Vestron, 1979). The Fonz as Scrooge? Yes, and Henry Winkler, who played the Fonz on TV’s “Happy Days,” doesn’t do badly as the miser. In this update, set in an American town during the Depression, Scrooge is the merciless president of a finance company. This forgotten TV movie does pile on the sentiment, but that’s largely why people watch holiday movies.

Heart-warming fare isn’t for everyone. For horror fans, or for those whose tastes are a bit perverse, there are two musts:

“Black Christmas” (Warner, 1975). During Christmas at a campus sorority house, co-eds are slowly being murdered by a maniac hiding in the attic. The killer, who has conversations with himself, is a fascinating character. A spine-tingling thriller, directed by Bob Clark, it’s doubly unsettling because of the contrasts with the otherwise happy holiday season. Margot Kidder stars as a tawdry sorority girl. Also called “Stranger in the House.”

“Silent Night, Deadly Night.” (USA, 1984). This is a startling slash-and-splatter movie about an ax-murderer dressed in a Santa suit. The concept--jolly Mr. Claus as a demented killer--is much more sordid than the actual murders, which are, in true genre-style, excessively grisly. For obvious reasons, don’t let the kiddies get anywhere near this one.