April's Christmas Countdown: #5 Home Alone

The magic of this movie, for me, is that this situation could conceivably happen in real life. The family has so many kids and they are so late, one eight-year-old can easily get lost in the shuffle (temporarily, of course). The parents soon realize that he is gone and try as hard as they can to get back to him as soon as possible. As a kid, I loved that an eight-year-old was clever enough to foil these two potentially dangerous burglars.
This movie is funny and clever and has just the right amount of holiday appreciation of family.

As far as the sequels go, I remember Home Alone 2: Lost in New York being okay-ish, but far-fetched enough that it wasn't as good as the first one. I can see someone forgetting a kid at home, but getting on the wrong plane? It seems pretty far-fetched to me, but maybe airlines used to be less observant. I've seen Home Alone 3, but to me it just didn't have the same charm as the first one.