Now that the historically nasty, contentious presidential election of 2024 is over, don’t let down your guard just yet. There’s another war percolating that most certainly could boil over come a day meant for expressing gratitude for loved ones. You guessed it: Thanksgiving.
Whether your candidate won or not, there’s gonna be trouble at Thanksgiving dinner tables across America. The election results will be argued over and litigated over gravy-splattered battlegrounds until the last leftover is reheated and consumed. This means that about 75 million Americans will be saying, “Pass the gravy, my candidate was robbed” or another 75 million will be saying, “More cranberries, I’m leaving the country” — but nobody will be saying, “I totally get where you’re coming from.”
To chill the room when the tempers are flaring hotter than a roasted turkey thigh, here are 10 songs and 10 movies designed to bring family peace and also ensure that all pies, pumpkin, peach or pecan, stay on the table for dessert and are not utilized as airborne missiles of political vengeance.
🎶 ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE (The Beatles)
No, it didn’t stop the Vietnam War back in 1967 when the Beatles first released it, but this hippie dippy retro-rock classic can still put a smile on the face of even the most sour election day loser.
🎶 JUST LIKE A WOMAN (Nina Simone)
One note of caution: Simone’s delivery of Bob Dylan’s classic line, “She breaks just like a little girl,” may be just too much emotion for some family members to take.
🎶 IMAGINE (John Lennon)
There’s always the danger of some Blue Meanie relative accusing you of being a pawn in George Soros’ plan for global domination by buying into John Lennon’s sweet utopian reverie about one world at peace, and in harmony, but hopefully there’s also a fair chance there’s a cool fool on the hill grannie around to tell the Meanie to let it be.
🎶 IT’S A MAN’S MAN’S MAN’S WORLD (James Brown)
This James Brown soul-stirrer (which he co-wrote with Betty Jean Newsome) can appease both sides of the election aisle. Its he-man title can slide alongside such dominant male anthems as the Village People’s “Macho Man,” a Trump rally staple (yep, go figure!) but, of course, the deeper message to the dudes is that all their deals and deeds “mean nothing without a woman or a girl.” Or as Joni Mitchell would say, “Both sides now.”
🎶 CRYSTAL BLUE PERSUASION (Tommy James & the Shondells)
Marijuana is pretty much legalized/normalized in almost all 50 states now, right? So what else is there to say?
🎶 HEAVY ON PRIDE (LIGHT ON LOVE) (Smokey Robinson)
“Never mind wasting time
Talking about who did who wrong
Heavy on pride, light on love
Give it up, baby
Oh, come on, give it up, baby”
This is why Dylan once listed Robinson as one of his favorite poets.
🎶 FIRST THERE IS A MOUNTAIN (Donovan)
The original peace and love troubadour has been calming down rancor, discord and bad vibes for nearly 60 years, starting with offering to clean up that broken bottle mess in the Dylan doc “Don’t Look Back.” This neat Zen ditty makes the point that no matter who won the election, it’s now time to breathe deep, dig the slowness and catch the wind.
🎶 WHAT’S GOING ON (Marvin Gaye)
Gaye’s epic social anthem for tumultuous times feels and reads like it was written last week. It might make it easier to pass the biscuits and put down the butter knives on Nov. 28.
“Picket lines and picket signs,
Don’t punish me with brutality.
Talk to me,
so you can see
what’s going on.”
🎶 BLOWIN’ IN THE WIND (Bob Dylan)
Imagine two of the most stridently political animals in your family menagerie are at one another’s throats over the election and you drop the needle on our favorite American Nobel laureate singing, “The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind.” It’s your cue to say, “Even Bob Dylan says who the eff knows the answer, can we bring out the peach cobbler, please!!!!!!!”
🎥 THREE COLORS: RED (Krzysztof Kieślowski)
This inspiring Euro arthouse film beautifully dramatizes the theme of “what unites us is stronger than what divides us” and it just might soothe the savage Democrats and Republicans in your house.
🎥 MEET THE FOCKERS (Jay Roach)
Her dad’s a crazy military intelligence fruitcake who makes you feel like a refugee at the dinner table, but we can still laugh and celebrate the wacky ways that love conquers all, socio-politico prejudices and punctures all poli-sci prickliness.
🎥 MOONLIGHT (Barry Jenkins)
The film’s lyrical and poetic evocation of how healing and compassion can transform lives will work like a charm unless it unleashes a “‘La La Land’ should have won the Oscar” argument.
🎥 GANDHI (Richard Attenborough)
It’s an epic big enough to fill your 65-inch screen and intimate enough to draw your family into the story of the original What’s So Funny About Peace Love and Understanding prophet.
🎥 CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (Steven Spielberg)
Since half of the people at your Thanksgiving dinner table might wish they could get on a spaceship and journey to another planet after the election, this should be a winning choice.
🎥 THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL (Robert Wise)
Sometimes, the only person that everyone will listen to is the person who isn’t beholden to anyone. Michael Rennie’s alien and his charismatic robot companion are calm, smooth and patrician, with Rennie’s hair so perfect you can only ponder what kind of salons they have on his home planet. “Day” is the ultimate “can’t we all get along” message movie.
🎥 THE FISHER KING (Terry Gilliam)
Just as Paul McCartney knew “The Fool on the Hill” could speak words of wisdom everyone would understand, screenwriter Richard LaGravenese and director Gilliam knew that a parable about a deranged homeless man and a cold-hearted media star could warm even the chilliest of hearts.
🎥 NOMADLAND (Chloé Zhao)
Since none of the politicians seem to address the epidemic of homelessness, you can still rally your dinner companions to engagement and compassion on this day when hundreds of thousands of Americans have no table to eat at or argue around.
🎥 BIG (Penny Marshall)
After these endless months of bad debates, indictments, assassination attempts, recalibrated campaigns and billions of dollars’ worth of advertisements, everyone in the family is ready to celebrate the discovery of their inner child.
🎥 BOB MARLEY: ONE LOVE (Reinaldo Marcus Green)
This is the movie that garners the ganja slot occupied by Tommy James on the playlist. Once everyone in the house is mildly buzzed, time to watch the biopic of the man who helpfully explained, “Never make a politician grant you a favor. They will always want to control you forever.”
