A hundred years before you spent the days before Christmas watching Home Alone and Elf, the slate of festive movies that audiences could choose from were mostly short and silent. Those films – strange, funny and surreal – were either inspired by fairytales or were dismal stories of the realities of 20th century life. If you’ve completed your watchlist already, here are seven gems from legendary directors of a bygone era that you’re likely to have never seen before. Words @douglasgrnwd