Our favorite wholesome holiday families

These wholesome families may face their share of challenges, but they stick together and love each other through their times of need.

The Smiths “Meet Me in St. Louis” (1944)

It should come as no surprise that many of these pure, happy families can be found in old classics like this one. While the film spans an entire year in the lives of the Smith family, the story’s climax happens at Christmas time, and it’s the film that gave us the song “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” so how could we consider it anything but a holiday classic? When the Smith family patriarch announces that the family will be moving from St. Louis to New York City in the new year, all four Smith sisters (and their mom) are utterly devastated. While they make their displeasure known, the entire film is centered around togetherness, and the idea that a family can be happy wherever they are, as long as they have each other. It’s a touching, happy film that will fill you with Christmas spirit, and it stars the great Judy Garland (“A Star Is Born,” 1954), as well as Margaret O’Brien (“The Secret Garden,” 1949), Mary Astor (“The Maltese Falcon,” 1941) and more.

The Cratchits “The Muppet Christmas Carol” (1992)

Ok, so I could have chosen any adaptation of Charles Dickens’s “A Christmas Carol,” but what can I say? I love the Muppets. Bob Cratchit (played in this adaptation by the fantastic Kermit the Frog) and his family are the epitome of good. A hard worker and loving father, Bob does his best to make ends meet, despite his nasty boss’s miserly and abusive ways. So unpleasant is this boss, Ebeneezer Scrooge (Michael Caine, “The Dark Knight,” 2008), that his name has become synonymous with words like cheapskate and misanthropist (meanie, tightwad, I could go on). While Scrooge is being whisked away by ghosts and learning just how wrong he’s been, Bob Cratchit returns to his meager home to tell his hungry family that there will be no Christmas bonus, or even a day off — and how do they respond? The family bands together, comforts one another and enjoys their sad Christmas meal despite the poor conditions in which they find themselves.

The Baileys “It’s a Wonderful Life” (1946)

What is a Christmas list without a mention of this abiding favorite? George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart, “Vertigo,” 1958) has been sacrificing his own wellbeing for others his whole life. He loses hearing in one ear saving his brother from a frozen pond. He gives up world travel and a college education to save his father’s business and send his brother to college. He gives up his honeymoon and his savings to keep the business solvent and save the people of Bedford Falls. When George finally (maybe inevitably) cracks, his loving family is his lifeline, and is there to help him pick up the pieces. Donna Reed (“From Here to Eternity,” 1953) is wonderful as Mary, George’s wife, who has been in love with him since they were teenagers, and Todd Karns (“The Courtship of Andy Hardy,” 1942) plays George’s brother, Harry.