Christmas holds a special place in pop-culture, as well as in countless people’s hearts. Thanks to annual rewatches of It’s a Wonderful Life or Miracle of 34th Street, these films become something more than just especially well-liked movies: they practically become a part of some people’s family history. That positive association has led to folks often flocking to theaters whenever a new Christmas open – after all, today’s newbie Yuletide title could become tomorrow’s annual holiday season fixture. Red One, for instance, recently opened to $34 million domestically, one of the biggest opening weekends ever for a Christmas-themed movie.
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However, Red One, and any other Christmas-themed feature, would need to really explode at the box office to dethrone the highest-grossing Christmas movie ever released. One motion picture reigns supreme as the most lucrative title in this subgenre…and it’s not even close.
How Much Money Did Home Alone Make?
With a massive $285.7 million domestic haul, Home Alone is by far the biggest Christmas movie ever released in North America. This Chris Columbus directorial effort entered a crowded holiday season marketplace in November of 1990, which initially seemed destined to smother Home Alone. On its opening weekend, Home Alone debuted in just 1,202 locations, significantly behind the theater count of other newcomers of that frame like Rocky V and The Rescuers: Down Under. In fact, Home Alone had the second-smallest theater count of the top eight biggest movies in North America that weekend – a sign of how small expectations were for this comedy.
Home Alone ruled the domestic box office for 12 consecutive weekends, making it the go-to must-see movie for the entire holiday season. Home Alone dominated all other 1990 movies at the domestic box office and, of course, ruled over all other Christmas movies. Even with over three decades of inflation, no movie has been able to dethrone Home Alone domestically. While not impossible, it would be very difficult to accomplish now given how truncated theatrical runs are now for many movies. Having one film rule the domestic box office for three months sounds more improbable than ever in 2024.
Those are the kinds of legs that get a movie like Home Alone to tremendous box office heights unheard of for any other Christmas movie. Not even Home Alone 2: Lost in New York in November 1992 could totally match its predecessors box office success. While its $173.5 million domestic haul was incredibly respectable on its own merits, that was still a sizeable decrease from the first movie. The Home Alone saga could not top itself. No wonder other Christmas movies have struggled to match its heights.
What’s Come Close to Toppling Home Alone?
In November 2018, another movie came closer than any other Christmas movie to toppling Home Alone domestically. Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch, hailing from the box office hit factory Illumination, grossed $272.69 million domestically. While $13.1 million behind Home Alone, it was only the second Christmas movie in history to exceed $270 million domestically. Interestingly, though, Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch did make more than Home Alone worldwide. Its $514.8 million global gross wasn’t just the first time a Christmas-themed movie made over $500 million worldwide.
It also meant Home Alone finally relinquished the worldwide Christmas movie box office crown. However, in North America, that honor still firmly resides with Home Alone. The only other motion picture to get super close to challenging Home Alone in this territory is yet another Dr. Seuss adaptation. In 2000, How the Grinch Stole Christmas hit $261.9 million, also coming within striking distance of Home Alone. Only that grouchy green figure has exceeded $200 million in North America among non-Home Alone Christmas fare.
Otherwise, the majority of Christmas movies are still far far behind Home Alone’s gargantuan haul. Even The Polar Express, which has benefited tremendously from countless theatrical re-releases, still has “only” amassed $188 million domestically, putting it nearly $100 million behind Home Alone’s North American gross. With only a handful of Christmas movies scheduled for theatrical release in 2025 and 2026, it also doesn’t look like a tremendous number of challengers for Home Alone’s box office crown are on the horizon.
If nothing else, though, Home Alone’s tremendous box office haul (and the fact that it beat Rocky V and The Rescuers Down Under on opening weekend) should signify to Hollywood the importance of taking chances on smaller, original ideas. Non-sequels are risky, sure, but follow-ups rarely, if ever, take off as massive sleeper hits like Home Alone or subsequent successes like The Greatest Showman or Everything Everywhere All at Once. The conceptually surefire sequels Home Alone opened against have largely faded from the pop culture radar. Meanwhile, an original feature like Home Alone still reigns supreme across all Christmas movies at the domestic box office. Such is the power of putting into theaters new concepts that strike a chord with moviegoers.
Happy Holidays! We hope you enjoy all your favorite movies!