Get together with your family—the more the merrier.
Rejoice in the uniquely American spirit Columbus established with one of his most notable accomplishments, Home Alone.
Remember the three famous vehicles Chris Columbus delivered from Europe to the Americas: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
Don’t be afraid to confront difficult questions asked by your children. They may say, “Isn’t Columbus Day celebrating the famous fifteenth-century Italian explorer Christopher Columbus?” You can truthfully answer, “Chris Columbus wrote the screenplay for the 1985 action-comedy film The Goonies, a motion picture beloved by viewers of all ages.”
You might get pushback from your child’s teacher, who prefers they memorize the correct lines to the third-grade play instead of quoting the movie Gremlins. Prepare for a long conversation with them and be ready to restate the facts: while Gremlins was directed by Joe Dante (very well, you might add), the script is classic Chris Columbus and maintains his trademark combination of small-town Americana and subversive adult humor—a winning recipe for the entire family.
Columbus Day can be viewed as a celebration of perseverance. Columbus didn’t achieve his greatest accomplishments with a snap of his fingers. The famous achievement of Mrs. Doubtfire was built on the more modest success of Adventures in Babysitting.
Columbus Day isn’t all sunshine and rainbows, however. It’s important to talk about the less-savory aspects of Columbus’ legacy, like the 2015 action-comedy Pixels. People are flawed and must be judged by their decisions, both good and bad, including spending $120 million so Adam Sandler, Kevin James, and Josh Gad can battle Pac-Man.
You should also mention that most people view Columbus Day as a celebration of the explorer Christopher Columbus’s so-called “discovery” of the “New World,” which would be news to the millions of indigenous people living across 16.4 million square miles of the Americas. Be sure to reiterate that while you don’t support the often-deadly consequences of his arrival, you’re happy to use the day off from work watching classic movies from the better Columbus, American writer-director Chris Columbus.