When it comes to holiday-themed movies, Thanksgiving doesn’t get nearly the same love as Christmas. To be fair, Christmas-themed movies probably outnumber every other holiday-themed movies combined. Halloween and even New Year’s get more love than Thanksgiving.
Which isn’t to say there aren’t some real classic movies around Turkey Day. In Home for the Holidays (1995), Jodie Foster directed an all-star cast (including Holly Hunter, Robert Downey Jr., Anne Bancroft, Dylan McDermott, Geraldine Chaplin, Steve Guttenberg, Claire Danes, Cynthia Stevenson, and Charles Durning) in a film that takes place over the Thanksgiving weekend. Free Birds was an entire animated movie about a turkey trying to escape from being dinner. And in Pieces of April (2003), the entire film centers around Katie Holmes’ April Burns trying to cook Thanksgiving dinner for her family.
But while the latter earned Patricia Clarkson a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination, none of them have received a Cosmo nod to date.
Here, then, are a few of our favorite Thanksgiving scenes from Cosmo-nominated films.
Cosmo-Nominated Thanksgiving Scenes
Tadpole (2002)
Aaron Stanford plays Oscar, nicknamed Tadpole, a 15-year-old boy who has decided that girls his own age are too immature, and has instead developed a crush on his stepmother, played by Sigourney Weaver. The film earned Stanford a Best Young Actor or Actress nomination at the 2002 Cosmos, the film’s only nomination. Here’s a scene with Stanford and Weaver at Thanksgiving:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_flZU87W_Rc&w=560&h=315]
Lady Bird (2017)
Greta Girwig’s acclaimed homage to her hometown of Sacramento won Best Comedic Film at the 2017 Cosmos and received five other nominations, including Best Director (Gerwig), Best Actress (Saoirse Ronan), Best Supporting Actress (Laurie Metcalf), Best Script, and Best Female Empowerment Film. In this scene, Ronan’s Lady Bird has disappointed her mother by choosing to spend her last Thanksgiving before going away for college with her boyfriend’s wealthier family. Here’s her boyfriend’s awkward meeting with Metcalf.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eemcxGzFIFU&w=560&h=315]
Spider-Man (2002)
There’s been, what, maybe a dozen films with Spider-Man if you include the Avengers films. But before Tom Holland and Andrew Garfield, there was Tobey Maguire’s big screen origination of the role in 2002. The film received five Cosmo nods, including Best Costume Design or Make-Up, Best Visual Effects, Actor’s Character You Would Most Like to be Intimate With (Tobey Maguire), Best Action/Adventure Film, and Best Science Fiction or Fantasy Film. In this scene, Peter Parker’s secret identify is almost revealed when he nearly gets caught after he goes out as Spider-Man to pick up cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving dinner.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaULrRqoqBE&w=560&h=315]
Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Brokeback Mountain broke our hearts at the 2005 Cosmos. It took home nine awards, including Best Film, Best Director (Ang Lee), Best Script, Best Cinematography, Art Direction or Set Design, Best Supporting Actor (Jake Gyllenhaal), Sexiest Ensemble Cast of a 2005 Film, Actor’s Character You Would Most Like to be Intimate With from a 2005 Film (Jake Gyllenhaal), Best Dramatic Film of 2005, and Best LGBTQ Film of 2005. And it received six other nominations: Best Lead Actor (Heath Ledger), Best Supporting Actress (Anne Hathaway and Michelle Williams), Best Ensemble Cast, Actor’s Character You Would Most Like to be Intimate With (Heath Ledger), and Best Historical Film. In this tense scene, Gyllenhaal stands up to his overbearing father-in-law at Thanksgiving dinner.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2x37ASry6A&w=560&h=315]
Addams Family Values (1993)
Even though it was released nearly a decade before the Cosmique Movie Awards began, Addams Family Values still earned two Lifetime Achievement nominations at the first Cosmos: Best Movie Based on a Television Series, and Best Movie Sequel That Was Better Than the Original. Even though much of the film takes place in the middle of summer, it boasts one of the most ridiculously over-the-top Thanksgiving scenes of all time with this Thanksgiving pageant play gone awry:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iGbxUAM0cc&w=560&h=315]
Honorable Mention
The Big Chill (1983)
Though it does have a big feast, The Big Chill doesn’t have a Thanksgiving scene … but it almost did. Jeff Goldblum and other cast members reveal that a flashback scene set at Thanksgiving was filmed, which would have been Kevin Costner’s only scene other than playing a corpse. Sadly, the scene was cut and no footage from it has ever surfaced. The Big Chill was nominated for Best Ensemble Cast of All Time at the first Cosmos, and for the Best Films Hall of Fame at the 2013 Awards.
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