A big-screen escape for Christmas …..

It might surprise you to know that going to see a movie on Christmas Day typically makes it one of the best and most profitable for theaters across America.

It’s due, in part, to the fact that hardly anything else is open on December 25 – particularly this year, when it falls on a Monday.

But it has also, over time, become something of a tradition for many U.S. families looking for something to do after all the gift-unwrapping and revelry is done.

And this year it’s coming at a time when movie houses have been closing in droves (there are fewer than half the number of theaters still in business in my home town, for example).

Still, there are plenty of studio publicists who are optimistic that the ‘movie bug’ will bite at Yuletide, so they hold a big title or two to open on the 25th of December that they hope will kick off the holiday with a bang, so to speak.

This year is no exception, and there are actually three films debuting on Christmas Day that should draw some curious – and celebratory – crowds to local moviehouses, they hope in droves.

A much-ballyhooed new version of The Color Purple hits the big screens on Monday and there are plenty of reasons why viewers should scramble to see it, what with the backing of Oprah Winfrey and some genuinely spectacular musical performances by a cast that includes a well-deserved starring role for a North Carolina native.

High Point’s own Fantasia Barrino plays Celie, the put-upon young woman who is determined to make something of her life despite all the odds seeming to be against her in director Blitz Bazawule and screenwriter Marcus Gardley’s adaptation of the stage musical version of Alice Walker’s 1982 novel that first was a memorable film in 1985 by Steven Spielberg (and filmed mostly in North Carolina).

The performances in this new version are fairly spectacular and the musical numbers will have you dancing in your seat right up to the closing moments of this well-made film that you most certainly will be talking about when the curtain comes down.

Another ultimately feel-good movie being unwrapped for all to see on Monday is The Boys in the Boat, producer-director George Clooney’s take on the Daniel James Brown book about the University of Washington’s rowing crew that dared to go up against the world’s best (and some arrogant Nazis) in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin.

Clooney (who doesn’t act in this one) channels Frank Capra big-time with a sweeping score and good performances by a bunch of mostly-unknown actors in what could easily be described as “Chariots of Fire in a boat,” and you’re guaranteed to be cheering along with the Olympians by the end of the tale.

The movie is beautifully shot and goes all-out to pump up a strong sense of patriotism in a time when we could all use more than a little picking up, what with the condition of the country and world right now.

A third Christmas debut is Ferrari, Michael Mann’s take on the Italian automotive genius when, in 1957, he was struggling to build an empire around his name and cement a reputation that still stands today.

Adam Driver plays Enzo Ferrari and does a good enough job as the crusty, controversial magnate, but it is likely the performance by Penelope Cruz, as Ferrari’s put-upon wife Laura, that’ll stick with you after the last frames roll.

Patrick Dempsey does a yeoman’s job as race car driver Piero Taruffi and Shallene Woodley is, honestly, mostly window-dressing as Ferrari’s mistress, but there’s enough oomph in the film that you’ll be satisfied with the results.

So there you have it. Three films worth seeing for a variety of reasons, and a guaranteed escape when you’ve just about had enough of the tinsel and tidings.

The Color Purple and The Boys in the Boat are rated PG-13 and are suitable for most ages (though toddlers wouldn’t get into them); Ferrari is rated R mostly for language, some violence and ‘adult situations’, and is pretty much for grownups only.