Thanksgiving Watch List: Eight Movies Actually Set on the Holiday (2026)

thanksgiving · Updated Sep 17, 2026

"Christmas movie" is a genre with its own aisle. "Thanksgiving movie" is a much shorter, much stranger list — travel-chaos comedies, family-dinner dramas, and one animated turkey heist. This is eight of them, actually set on or around the holiday rather than just released near it, in a rough order from lightest to heaviest.

The list

1.
A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving (1973) — TMDB 13479. Twenty-five minutes, animated, and the one entry here safe for a whole family regardless of age. Peppermint Patty invites herself over; Charlie Brown can cook exactly two things.
2.
Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987) — TMDB 2609. A marketing executive trying to get home to Chicago for Thanksgiving keeps colliding with an overbearing traveling salesman. The travel-day-from-hell comedy every other one in this genre gets compared to.
3.
Free Birds (2013) — TMDB 175574. Two animated turkeys time-travel to get turkey off the Thanksgiving menu permanently. The one genuinely kid-first pick on this list besides the Peanuts special.
4.
Miracle on 34th Street (1947) — TMDB 11881. Opens at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade and runs through Christmas — the one film here that bridges both holidays instead of picking one.
5.
What's Cooking? (2000) — TMDB 77434. Four families of different backgrounds, one street, one Thanksgiving dinner each — an ensemble structure instead of one household's story.
6.
Home for the Holidays (1995) — TMDB 9089. A woman who's just lost her job flies home for Thanksgiving with her chaotic extended family. Warmer than it sounds, sharper than a straight comedy.
7.
Pieces of April (2003) — TMDB 1550. An estranged daughter tries to cook Thanksgiving dinner for her dying mother's visit and everything in the kitchen goes wrong at once. Small, low-budget, and the most purely about the holiday itself of anything on this list.
8.
The Ice Storm (1997) — TMDB 68924. Two families come apart over the Thanksgiving weekend of 1973. The drama end of the list — save it for after the dishes are done, not during dinner.

How to use this list

There's no single "right" Thanksgiving movie the way there's a default Christmas one — this list runs comedy to drama on purpose, so pick for the room you're actually sitting in rather than assuming everyone wants the same tone. The Peanuts special and Free Birds work with kids in the room; the last three are better after they've gone to bed.

If you're tracking as a household, add whichever of these you haven't both seen to your shared watchlist before the day arrives — one less thing to negotiate once everyone's actually at the table.

SOURCES

• themoviedb.org/movie/2609-planes-trains-and-automobiles (observed 2026-09-17)

• themoviedb.org/movie/9089-home-for-the-holidays (observed 2026-09-17)

• themoviedb.org/movie/1550-pieces-of-april (observed 2026-09-17)

• themoviedb.org/movie/13479-a-charlie-brown-thanksgiving (observed 2026-09-17)

• themoviedb.org/movie/175574-free-birds (observed 2026-09-17)

• themoviedb.org/movie/77434-what-s-cooking (observed 2026-09-17)

• themoviedb.org/movie/68924-the-ice-storm (observed 2026-09-17)

• themoviedb.org/movie/11881-miracle-on-34th-street (observed 2026-09-17)

Read the other seasonal lists