27 of the best eclectic Thanksgiving Movies to enjoy as you make your holiday preparations

“Thanksgiving” movies. The most American genre of films. It’s fun to relax with some seasonally appropriate entertainment in-between all of the moments we spend planning, shopping, decorating, and cooking for our big American autumn holiday!

That’s exactly why we’ve decided to put together this list of Thanksgiving-themed movies certain to deliver that festive laughter, warmth, and good-old-fashioned family dysfunction we’ve long come to expect from our modern-day harvest celebrations!

Be patient – it’s a long list and may take a few seconds for the entire thing to load below 🙂

Thanksgiving is one of those quintessential American holidays that has carved out it’s own niche in our nation’s cinematic story — but, oftentimes, the movies depicting Turkey Day happenings tend to be quieter, indie-film affairs. You may need to seek them out.

While making our choices for this annual list, we did some digging and headed further afield to offer up a wide variety of films capable of reflecting (and sometimes exaggerating to great comedic/dramatic effect) some of the various essences characterizing this family, friends, and food holiday.

These are movies that shine a light on the kaleidoscope of multicultural approaches to preparing traditional Thanksgiving cuisine. They place an emphasis on the joys and challenges that family members, who may not see each other too often, face when they reunite for a few days to celebrate the seasonal tradition. There’s laughter. There’s warmth. There’s also, usually, a heaping helping of conflict among kith and kin.

Some of these are movies that expose how the hopes, dreams, relationships, and other minutiae of our modern lives look to us when we’re forced to see them through the eyes of our loved ones. Others movies on this list are likely to open discussions about generational and cultural political differences.

And most of these films accomplish what they do against a backdrop of seasonally appropriate cinematography and engaging musical soundtracks.

In the end, we all have our personal stories. No matter who we are, we all bring a little of ourselves to the food (and conversation) we share around our Thanksgiving tables. We all need to process the waves of nostalgia that surface when we lay our eyes, once again, on our hometown streets, family members, and old friends. We talk about the old memories. We create some new ones along the way.

And while some aspects of Thanksgiving gatherings may test facets of our fortitude — we know it can’t be THAT bad, because we all get together to celebrate Christmas just one month later!

Let’s start this list out with some Hallmark Channel, Thanksgiving-flavored, junk food for the brain! This movie is pure cartoonish-guilty-pleasure viewing with absolutely zero basis in reality — but that doesn’t stop it from being a fun time-waster on a lazy autumn afternoon!

SUMMARY: When Boston lawyer Mary Ross (Emily Rose) inherits a house in Plymouth, Massachusetts from her late aunt, she has no idea she may have inherited a historical treasure. Mary’s initial desire to sell the house is supported by her slick boyfriend, Rick (Adam Kaufman), but she is shocked to discover local historian Everett Mather (Justin Bruening) has evidence that her house is located on the site of the first Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving fills our houses and neighborhoods with lots of people who usually aren’t there! Some are the friends. Some are the aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents who live elsewhere. And some are the children who used to live here, but went away to grow up a little — and now they’re back. Somewhere between the football, and the casseroles, and the turkey, and the pumpkin pie; once the first waves of dysfunction start to roll in, no one is safe. Sometimes the reverberating T-Day ripples hold the potential to change friendships and families forever. The question: Is that, ultimately, a bad thing?

SUMMARY: The enduring friendship between the Walling and Ostroff families is tested when Nina, the prodigal Ostroff daughter (Leighton Meester), returns home for Thanksgiving after a five-year absence and enters into an affair with David, head of the Walling family (Hugh Laurie).

Abby is looking forward to a laid-back Thanksgiving with her best friend Molly. But the friends’ plans for a quiet turkey dinner go up in smoke when they’re joined by Molly’s new boyfriend and her flamboyant mother. Throw in some party crashers including Molly’s old flame, a wannabe shaman, and a trio of Fairy Gay Mothers, and it’s a recipe for a comically chaotic holiday no one will ever forget-even if they wanted to.

SUMMARY: An entertaining hop on the merry-go-round of modern-day Thanksgiving problems. It’s an amusing indie-flick – even if the (often) less-than-family-friendly style humor might not be for everyone. Let’s face it – we’re not watching Citizen Kane, here; but those seeking a few crude and quirky Turkey-day laughs will likely find themselves in a holiday mood by the time the credits roll and the hilarious outtakes begin.

Quirky. Sophisticated. Exceedingly well-written. A New York story. A coming-of-age drama. A screwball comedy. An American Dream allegory. Set, in an understated way, during the Thanksgiving season. Baumbach’s film “seems to be a film of low stakes and minor ambition, yet its execution is far more satisfying. With almost endlessly quotable dialogue, two truly winning lead performances and an energetic score, Mistress America is yet another comedic triumph from the creative partnership of Baumbach and Gerwig.”

SUMMARY: In MISTRESS AMERICA, Tracy (Lola Kirke) is a lonely college freshman in New York, having neither the exciting university experience nor the glamorous metropolitan lifestyle she envisioned. But when she is taken in by her soon-to-be stepsister, Brooke (Greta Gerwig) – the resident of Times Square + adventuresome achievement-oriented motor-mouth 30-year-old daughter of the geologist her mom plans on marrying on Thanksgiving – she is rescued from her disappointment and seduced by Brooke’s alluringly mad schemes. When the two hook up together they go on a series of misadventures, which in the end takes them to the wealthy community of Greenwich, Connecticut, for the film’s centerpiece sketch.

It’s an annual tradition. Let’s face it. For some people, it’s just not Thanksgiving until they’ve heard Arlo Guthrie strum out the full 18 minutes and 34 seconds of his 1967 holiday opus, the “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree”. And the 1969 film version of “Alice’s Restaurant” finds its way onto many a Thanksgiving movie list. But if we’re speaking honestly, that uneven movie is of middling quality, at best. We think you’ll find this PBS concert documentary by Director Jim Brown much more palatable! Morale of the story: Be careful with your Thanksgiving Day garbage, otherwise you might find yourself on the Group W bench!

SUMMARY: Arlo Guthrie celebrates the fiftieth anniversary of the events that snowballed into the Alice’s Restaurant Massacree, his iconic talking blues narrative that has become an established part of the Thanksgiving tradition, with an unprecedented show. Backed by his band of friends, Arlo regales the audience with the Massacree in its entirety, along with many of his best-loved classics.

If, after the recent Presidential election cycle, you still don’t feel as if you’ve had your fill of partisan politics for this year — then you’ll absolutely LOVE “The Oath”. A word of warning: this one’s not for timid viewers. Just when you think it’s gotten as crazy as a movie can get, you begin to realize they’ve only just begun to turn up the ridiculousness. It can be cathartic to watch a movie that makes you understand that no matter how bad the political disagreements are at your family’s Thanksgiving dinner are — they can always be worse!

SUMMARY: Chris (Ike Barinholtz) and Kai (Tiffany Haddish) agree not to sign an oath of loyalty to the United States for tax incentives. The deadline is Black Friday and a politically-charged Chris focuses on getting through the holiday with his family while he pours over the news regarding The Oath. The day after Thanksgiving, he and his family are surprised when agents show up to interrogate him. The Oath draws on hyper-partisan modern politics for a pointedly funny satire that hits its targets hard and often enough to more than achieve its desired discomfort.

“It all started the morning after Thanksgiving, after my sister’s husband Louis left for work, she found a note and it looked like a love letter…” Underrated and under-seen, but a true gem of a dark comedy set against the backdrop of a Thanksgiving, after the holiday has passed but while the family is still together. This movie really rings with that special, cozy feeling that so many mid-90s era independent films managed to capture (but for some reason became lost to us once the new millennium hit). Hell of a cast. Parker Posey is a standout in this one, as always.

SUMMARY: With its droll humor and bittersweet emotional heft, the feature debut of writer-director Greg Mottola announced the arrival of an unassumingly sharp-witted new talent on the 1990s indie film scene. When she discovers a love letter written to her husband (Stanley Tucci) by an unknown paramour, the distraught Eliza (Hope Davis) turns to her tight-knit Long Island family for advice. Soon the entire clan—strong-willed mom (Anne Meara), taciturn dad (Pat McNamara), and jaded sister (Parker Posey) with pretentious boyfriend (Liev Schreiber) in tow—has squeezed into a station wagon and headed into Manhattan to find out the truth, kicking off a one-crazy-day odyssey full of unexpected detours and life-changing revelations. Performed with deadpan virtuosity by a top-flight ensemble cast, THE DAYTRIPPERS is a wry and piercing look at family bonds stretched to the breaking point.

A Thanksgiving classic. A wintry atmosphere. An empty cabin. An old-fashioned love story. Grab some mulled cider to sip with the one you love, turn down the lights, turn on the movie, and lose yourself in this timeless holiday tale…

SUMMARY: Originally aired on CBS, the made-for-TV holiday romance One Special Night brings together James Garner and Julie Andrews for their third feature together. Robert (Garner) visits his wife in the hospital, who is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. There he meets the stern Catherine (Andrews), a widowed pediatrician who spends her downtime visiting the room in the hospital where her husband died a year ago. In the middle of a raging snowstorm on Thanksgiving, Catherine offers Robert a ride and they get stuck in the snow. Taking refuge in an empty cabin, the couple get over their initial personality conflicts to engage in a meaningful dialogue.

“Hollidaysburg” is one (of two) movies developed from the same screenplay as part of the Starz TV network’s filmmaker competition series, “The Chair.” The story is a familiar one: College freshmen return home for Thanksgiving and realize some things have changed – while others have stayed exactly the same. While this film may feel derivative of “Garden State” at times, there are still more than enough reasons to give it some screen time!

SUMMARY: Arriving home at (the quaint, but otherwise unremarkable) Hollidaysburg, Pa for Thanksgiving break after their first semester at college, we follow a group of recent high school grads as they reconnect — or attempt to — over the course of one quick, pivotal weekend. Think romance, friendship, families, parties, pumpkin pie-making, and more — as life lessons are learned along the way.

OK. So “American Movie” isn’t necessarily a full blown Thanksgiving movie – but a good portion of the events take place around the dreary-weather holiday – and there are a few memorable, alcohol-soaked scenes that focus on turkey preparation and family/friend relationships during a decidedly low-key Thanksgiving dinner. This is a highly-rated and attention-worthy documentary about a regular guy with a movie camera in his hand, continuing to chase the American dream at all costs — no matter how far (or often) that dream continues to slip away. “You’ll get to see Americans, and American dreams, and you won’t walk away depressed after seeing this!”

SUMMARY: Documentary about an aspiring filmmaker’s attempts to finance his dream project by finally completing the low-budget horror film he abandoned years before.

A mentally unbalanced young woman – who is convinced she is Jackie Kennedy – flies into a murderous rage when her twin brother returns home for Thanksgiving to reveal he is engaged.

SUMMARY: Apparently, 1997 was a HUGE year for Thanksgiving film releases — and this rapid-fire-fast-talking, head-scratchingly dark and subversive work is one among the bumper crop bounty of holiday movies harvested back in that exceedingly fertile year. The House of Yes takes family dysfunction to surprisingly outlandish levels — even for a Thanksgiving movie. It truly is the Parker Posey show – and watching her work is as delightful as always! I did read one review of this movie with a smile: “It’s not as tasteless as it might sound.” Is it twisted? Is it perverted? Is it mad? Whatever it IS, if you watch The House of Yes, you very likely won’t forget about it anytime soon thereafter.

Fathers and sons with unresolved issues. Brothers. Girlfriends. A return home for the Thanksgiving holiday. What is the right thing to do? Following where the heart leads versus honoring family obligations. Imagine “Dan In Real Life”, but quite a bit darker, with deeply troubled characters, secrets, and sexual tension PLUS a touch of disturbingly crass humor alongside the holiday trappings. “Sometimes, people know what they are doing is wrong but they do it anyway, because doing the right thing is painful.”

SUMMARY: A man tries to warn his brother away from the new girlfriend he brings home during Thanksgiving, but ends up becoming infatuated with her in the process.

It’s Richard Jenkins. It’s Amy Schumer. It’s dark. It’s creepy. It’s bleak. It’s artsy. It’s slow moving. It’s not a horror movie. It’s a family drama from A24. “In theory, it’s about a family gathering for a Thanksgiving lunch, the sort of event that can usually be expected to bring about the phased disclosure of all the characters’ individual secrets and micro-tragedies. This feels more serious. These people look like the last group of humans left alive after some apocalyptic catastrophe, the remnants of homo sapiens being watched and examined at a distance by aliens. The grimly damp and undecorated duplex in which they have assembled could almost be a mass hallucination, triggered by a trauma worse than anything they’re talking about.” As the darkness falls, we find that all have less to be thankful about.

SUMMARY: Based on the Tony Award-winning play. Erik Blake has gathered three generations of his Pennsylvania family to celebrate Thanksgiving at his daughter’s apartment in lower Manhattan. As darkness falls outside and eerie things start to go bump in the night, the group’s deepest fears are laid bare. Amidst the warmth and humor of the holiday, the tight-knit family tries to hold together in the face of an anxious and uncertain future.

“Scent of a Woman, starring Al Pacino and Chris O’Donnell, tells the story of a young prep school student, Charlie Simms (a fresh-faced Chris O’Donnell), who needs to make some cash for the holidays and agrees to be a caretaker to a blind, retired veteran, Lt. Col. Frank Slade (Al Pacino, who won an Oscar for his performance).”

SUMMARY: Scent of a Woman is a real over-performer for a Thanksgiving-themed film. It grossed more than $134,095,253 worldwide. Pacino won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance and the film was nominated for Best Director, Best Picture and Best Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published. The film also won three major awards at the Golden Globe Awards: Best Screenplay, Best Actor and Best Motion Picture – Drama. All this PLUS: a young Philip Seymour Hoffman? Pass the gravy!

A throwback Thanksgiving family comedy with a lesbian twist. “Lez Bomb may traffic in cliches, but it delivers its messages of love, tolerance and acceptance in such light-hearted, warm fashion that the missteps are easy to overlook.”

SUMMARY: Lauren is a young woman living in Jersey City who travels back to her hometown of Ramsey, New Jersey for the Thanksgiving holiday. Lauren has a secret: she is a closeted lesbian who has not yet come out to her dysfunctional and conservative family, finally deciding to do so by inviting her lover, Hailey, over to meet at her parents’ house. However, things take a turn when Lauren’s male roommate, Austin, shows up and Lauren’s parents mistake him for her boyfriend. That leads Lauren to persuade Austin to go along with the charade until she has the courage to tell her family the truth about who she is.

“You cut the turkey without me?!” This is the sentence that Roger Ebert called “the greatest line of dialogue in a Thanksgiving movie.” This epic film, primarily set in 1950’s Baltimore, follows a group of first and second generation Jewish-Americans as they experience first-hand the birth of the suburban middle class – and all of the changes in family, life, and culture (both good and bad) that occur as a result of the progress.

SUMMARY: A Polish-Jewish family comes to the U.S. at the beginning of the twentieth century. There, the family and their children try to make themselves a better future in the so-called promised land.

Fed up with being single on holidays, two strangers agree to be each other’s platonic plus-ones all year long, only to catch real feelings along the way.

SUMMARY: This multi-holiday film (Christmas, New Year’s Eve, Valentine’s Day, St Patrick’s Day, Easter, Cinco De Mayo, Mother’s Day, Fourth of July, Halloween, AND Thanksgiving) directed by John Whitesell stars Emma Roberts, Luke Bracey, Jake Manley, Jessica Capshaw, Andrew Bachelor, Frances Fisher, Manish Dayal and Kristin Chenoweth. Youthful (and even slightly edgy at times), this movie delivers plenty of feel-good moments along the way. Originally released on Netflix, this is one of those slick + modern rom-coms that almost feels as if it was produced by an AI streaming-era algorithm custom-programmed to please the maximum number of viewers in their targeted demographic.

This is one of those rare movies that, despite good ratings, doesn’t seem to have found its way to any of the major streaming platforms, yet. So you’ll need to go all old-school and physical media for this viewing experience.

SUMMARY: This highly acclaimed motion picture stars Emilio Estevez, Kathy Bates, and Martin Sheen. Estevez (who also directed) plays a returning Vietnam War hero whose haunting experiences leave him unable to adjust to the quiet realities of small town life. At odds with his domineering father (Sheen), his desperately cheerful mother (Bates), and free-spirited younger sister (Kimberly Williams) — tensions at home soon escalate, finally reaching the breaking point one fateful Thanksgiving Day.

This braided narrative of a movie about four melting pot families in Los Angeles as they gather for the holiday and navigate their way through love, problems, and acceptance issues – also just happens to have one of the best Thanksgiving food preparation montages ever to hit the big screen!

SUMMARY: A funny, mouth-watering and deeply moving vision of 21st century diversity and the future of the American family.

While Richard Nixon’s “I am not a crook” speech drones from the TV, the Hood and Carver families try to navigate a Thanksgiving break simmering with unspoken resentment, sexual tension, and cultural confusion. With clarity, subtlety, and a dose of wicked humor, Academy Award–winning director Ang Lee (Life of Pi) renders Rick Moody’s acclaimed novel of upper-middle-class American malaise as a trenchant, tragic cinematic portrait of lost souls. Featuring a tremendous cast of established actors (Kevin Kline, Joan Allen, Sigourney Weaver) and rising stars (Tobey Maguire, Christina Ricci, Elijah Wood, Katie Holmes) THE ICE STORM is among the finest films of the 1990s.

SUMMARY: In suburban New Canaan Connecticut (circa 1973), middle class families experimenting with casual sex, drink and drugs find their lives out of control. When a self-centered husband’s relationship with his wife and mistress grow cold, it takes a wife-swapping “key party” and a freak ice storm to clear the air and change their lives forever. It’s a captivating piece of film-based artwork – and it weaves a captivating spell – but you may want to save one of the more cheery movies on this list to help lift your mood in the aftermath 🙂

“Considered by many to be Woody Allen’s best film, even over Annie Hall. Hannah and Her Sisters follows a multitude of characters: Hannah (Mia Farrow), who plays den mother to her extended family; her sister Lee (Barbara Hershey), emotional and a bit of a flake, who’s involved with a much older artist (Max Von Sydow), who treats her like a child; and Hannah’s other sister, Holly (Dianne Wiest), a neurotic who feels incapable of managing her life. Hannah’s husband Elliot (Michael Caine) falls in love with Lee, which sets off a series of upheavals. Allen gives one of his best performances as Hannah’s ex-husband Mickey, who–much like Allen himself–is obsessed with death and unhappiness. But a simple summary doesn’t begin to capture the warmth and intimacy of this movie; though the story follows a capsizing family, the outcome is surprising, joyous, and richly human.”

SUMMARY: Hannah and her Sisters is a Thanksgiving classic, for certain! The story is told in three main arcs, with most of it occurring during a 24-month period beginning and ending at Thanksgiving parties. From the ensemble cast, to the cinematography of the handsome NYC settings, through the meandering (and very human) dialogue PLUS delightful Thanksgiving bookends — if you haven’t seen it, this one should be on your list!

A young girl in her first NYC apartment desperately wants to show her slightly estranged family (including a mother with terminal cancer) she’s successfully adulting by inviting them to visit her, introducing them to her, and cooking them a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. Nothing goes as planned – forcing her to finally interact with neighbors in her building (who she’s never met before). It’s a quirky and enjoyable movie with excellent performances accented by moments of authentic humor meshed up against meaningful human insight.

SUMMARY: Katie Holmes is terrific as the quirky black sheep of her family in this delightful comedy-drama that “sparkles with acerbic wit, original characters and genuine heart”. Academy Award nominee* Patricia Clarkson gives “a career-making performance”, and “the entire cast is inspired” in this “moving, hilarious comedy”. Rebellious daughter April Burns (Holmes) has offered to host an elaborate Thanksgiving dinner for her suburban clan in her grubby Lower East Side apartment. But her attempts to create an unforgettable feast go awry when she discovers that her oven doesn’t work. Now, as her weary family makes its way to the city, April must rely on the kindness of strangers to pull off the perfect meal and the perfect memory.

A Chicago advertising man must struggle to travel home from New York for Thanksgiving, with a lovable oaf of a shower curtain ring salesman as his only companion.

SUMMARY: Planes, Trains and Automobiles is a 1987 American comedy film written, produced, and directed by John Hughes. It stars Steve Martin as Neal Page, a high-strung marketing executive, and John Candy as Del Griffith, a goodhearted but annoying shower curtain ring salesman. They share a three-day odyssey of misadventures trying to get Neal home to Chicago in time for Thanksgiving with his family. The film received critical acclaim, with many critics praising it for Hughes branching out from teen comedies, and for the performances of Candy and Martin. There’s humor, heart, and more in this hilarious holiday classic!

A fresh (2 episode) look at the Mayflower journey and the founding of Plimoth Plantation; brought to the screen by National Geographic with very high “period piece” production values. The harsh climate. The personalities. The cultural divide. The first Thanksgiving. Even some of the ugly events. This story is more fully told by alternating back and forth between the perspectives of Governor Bradford AND the major Native American historical figures (Tisquantum, Massasoit, and Hobbamock). The Indigenous characters in the miniseries even speak Western Abenaki, a language similar to but distinct from that which would have been spoken by the Wampanoag of the time.

SUMMARY: Vincent Kartheiser (Mad Men), Anna Camp (Pitch Perfect) and Ron Livingston (Office Space) star in the acclaimed miniseries event Saints & Strangers, which dramatizes the Pilgrims’ harrowing voyage and arrival to America. Loyalties are tested and hard-fought alliances become strained when the Pilgrims suspect a traitor in their midst.

The stark Maine setting. The emotionally distant father. The son, home from the city. The relationship he left behind. “The Myth of Fingerprints” is about a character returning home to spend time with the people he has outgrown. This is a hidden gem of a character-based slow burner. There’s some humor along the way but, be advised, there’s no cotton candy or hollywood ending.

SUMMARY: The adult children of a conservative New England family return home for Thanksgiving weekend and find themselves forced to come to grips with their family’s dysfunction. The prime difficulty comes from the fact that their parents, particularly their already taciturn and enigmatic father, are rapidly distancing themselves from their children.

Siblings all decide to live their lives in their own ways. Some stay close to home. Others are called to venture out and see what the world has in store for them. There’s no right or wrong, but when everyone gets back together for the holiday, these types of life choices (and the far-flung implications surrounding them) can sometimes make for memorable Thanksgiving Dinner experiences! Sure, there’s plenty of family drama here, but it’s all handled in a warm and nostalgia-drenched style. This is a perfect film to watch on Thanksgiving evening. When the meal is over, the dishes are done, the leftovers are all packed up, and inevitable Christmas is firmly on the horizon.

SUMMARY: At the end of her rope with her career and teenage daughter, a woman reluctantly heads home for her chaotic family Thanksgiving. Directed by Jodie Foster.

Isn’t it great to have the family all back together under one roof? Just ask white-wine-wasted family patriarch Poppy (played by Peter Bogdanovich), who has his three grown children visiting his Pasadena home for Thanksgiving — as all of them hope to get their father alone for a few moments to ask him for a much-needed infusion of cash. After all, modern lives are complicated, and often require a little outside funding. Greed. Politics. Family dysfunction. An unforgettable Thanksgiving dinner. This one has them all!

SUMMARY: Thanksgiving for the eccentric Turner clan goes from bad to worse when estranged daughter Nina (Alicia Witt, Friday Night Lights) makes a surprise visit home for the first time in 15 years. She clashes with her stepmother Deborah (Cheryl Hines, Curb Your Enthusiasm), while half-brother Jacob (Ashton Holmes, Revenge) tries to keep a massive gambling debt a secret. A film festival favorite.

This excellent, in-depth, and often surprising PBS documentary focuses primarily (though not solely) on William Bradford and what we know of the history of the Pilgrims through Bradford’s book “Of Plymouth Plantation”. Commentary provided by a variety of well-informed and passionate historians (Nathaniel Philbrick, Nick Bunker, Sue Allan, John Demos, and more) serves to add context, while remaining respectful and accurate to the history of both the Pilgrims and the Native Americans. Lots of eye-opening stuff here! Truly a must-watch for anyone who desires to dive significantly deeper on the origins of our national Thanksgiving holiday PLUS all of the important occurrences “Of Plymouth Plantation”.

SUMMARY: A documentary film by award-winning director Ric Burns, The Pilgrims chronicles the deep history, origins, and critical first decade of the first permanent English colony in New England.

Writing by Eric Taubert (Taubert Gallery – The Fine Art Photography of Eric Taubert). Find him on Twitter at @erictaubert. Find him on Instagram at @erictaubert.