With Easter right around the corner, which movies will get you into the holiday spirit?
From animation to live-action, there are countless movies to choose from when Easter rolls around. Many of these movies you might remember watching as a kid and may still feel just as magical today! Here is a list of some of my personal favorites and recommendations for this Easter season.
While Easter is the celebration of the resurrection of Christ, one way we have celebrated is with the easter bunny and candy. “Hop” is an all-time classic and a personal favorite. It’s an Easter movie where a bunny, named EB, is supposed to take over for his father in the Easter Bunny business. However, his passion is to play the drums so as a solution, he decides to run away to Los Angeles where he meets a human filled with Easter Spirit. This is the perfect movie for all ages!
Focused on the bunny part of Easter, “Peter Rabbit” is a movie about a family of rabbits who have a back-and-forth fight with an old man and his garden. When the old man dies, they take over his home, having some fun with other animals from the garden before the nephew steps in and takes over. It’s a super cute movie and while it isn’t about Easter or the Easter Bunny, it still puts you into an Easter mood.
“Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”
Whether you choose the original movie or the Johnny Depp version, “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” is great for any day of the year. When a poor, young boy visits the incredible chocolate factory with his grandfather, he sees different rooms filled with candy and how they’re made. It’s such a wonderful and timeless story–great for all generations. While this film is set in the winter around Christmas and not Easter, it focuses on the one aspect associated with the holiday, candy.
While this isn’t a story that takes place during the Easter season or is about the Easter Bunny or candy, this is still one of my favorite movies around Easter time. “Heaven Is For Real” is a movie about a child who goes to heaven and returns back to Earth. I put this in the Easter movie category because it’s about a child who died, went to heaven and came back to life which is the basic story of the Resurrection of Christ. Although Christ did not remain on the earth once he was resurrected, it shows that it can and did happen.
If you’re looking for something more biblically accurate or focused more on the reason why we celebrate Easter, “The Passion of the Christ” is a great movie that illustrates exactly what went on during Holy Week and what happened at the cross. While there are parts of it that are not biblically accurate, for the most part, it stays true to the story that we know. This is for sure one movie that is played during Easter. It is a great way for those who don’t enjoy reading to see and hear what actually happened visually.
“The Prince of Egypt” isn’t exactly an Easter movie but it does talk about Passover which overlaps the season of Easter. Passover is a Jewish holiday that celebrates the Israelites’ escape from slavery in Egypt. “The Prince of Egypt” is an animated telling of the story of Moses which is found in the book of Exodus. This movie is mostly accurate and paints a great picture for children who are learning about the Bible and Passover.
“It’s The Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown”
Would it be a holiday if there wasn’t a Charlie Brown special? “It’s The Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown” is a 30-minute episode that replaces the Easter Bunny for the Easter Beagle but the job is all the same. It is a super cute and short movie for all ages and resurrects the feeling of being a kid back to life.
“VeggieTales: Twas the Night Before Easter & An Easter Carol”
If you truly want to learn something about Easter, what better way to learn than by watching VeggieTales? If you grew up in or around the church VeggieTales was where you went to learn. It’s a show about a bunch of vegetables explaining the Bible to children and even adults, in an animated, comical way that hooks you into wanting more. They hit every fact on point and make it so entertaining.
As we get closer to Resurrection Sunday, these movies help get you into the feeling of joy and peace, both of which came after Christ died on the cross. Whether you’re into the movie for a warm feeling or watching for the hard-hitting facts of the Resurrection, take these movies into consideration, you won’t be disappointed.