Devouring 2025's Festive Features: Highlights, Lowlights, and Unexpected Delights.

It is the time of year to lounge on the couch and demolish a box of mince pies in front of a terrific flick, a poor film, or one that’s so bad it’s good.

As always, a crop of new seasonal stories hopes to be part of our seasonal watchlist—perhaps even joining the ranks alongside enduring classics like Home Alone, Elf, Love Actually, and Die Hard (we won’t debate it).

So, in a helpful attempt to separate the winners from the losers, and to embrace the holiday mood, I watched as many recent Christmas films as possible in a single day.

Early Morning: A Very Jonas Christmas Movie

Starting, ideally, on a positive note. This is the sole 2025 entry on a famous website's list of the top 100 holiday films of all time.

The Jonas Brothers are stranded in the UK after wrapping up their international trek and must get home for Christmas. Their attempts are hindered by an malevolent Father Christmas, who bursts into melody to announce they won’t get home until they “find their familial spark.”

The banter between the bickering brothers is enjoyable even for the non-fan, while devotees will undoubtedly pick up on lots of references as they try to get back using all transportation available.

It’s a travelogue of mishaps.

It’s not an all-time classic, but is great for devotees and a good start to the day.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄🎄 for Jonas Brothers fans or 🎄🎄🎄 for their family members who must sit through it.

8.45am - Tinsel Town

A-list actor Kiefer Sutherland has been cast as a Hollywood star roped into a traditional British stage show.

“A panto-what??” asks Sutherland’s “difficult” and older lead Brad Mack, who has hit a rough patch and whose representative has misled him into thinking he’s appearing in renowned British drama.

His pantomime fellow actors let him know he’s playing Buttons. “No I'm not,” he protests. It's easy to predict their retort. Unless you’re unfamiliar with traditional British theatre traditions.

There are some great jokes, some heartwarming side stories, and the rest of the cast is excellent, too.

It’s the sort of feature that would be a bit naff at a different time, but is a great entertainment at Christmas.

Festive score: 🎄🎄🎄🎄

Mid-Morning: Christmas Karma

A familiar face shows up at the start of this film, too, calling someone a mug for the next movie straight. Could this be a fresh holiday staple?

This time, he’s a crooning chauffeur who picks up Mr Sood, the modern take on Mr Scrooge from Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.

Mr Sood is played by an actor from Kunal Nayyar and Christmas Karma is directed by Bend It Like Beckham’s Gurinder Chadha. The well-known tale unfolds as the stingy Mr Sood is confronted by the ghosts of Christmas yesterday, today, and tomorrow, played by Hugh Bonneville, Billy Porter, and Boy George.

This cultural adaptation is at least different from all the others, but sadly he’s not very compelling and Nayyar’s portrayal is flat—a problem when he’s so central to everything.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄

Noon: A BBC Special

There's just enough time for a network's Christmas comedy-drama—which stars Guz Khan as a charmingly cantankerous character who “doesn’t really do Christmas.”

But after he is awarded an £8,000 Christmas bonus at work, his wife (starring Morgana Robinson) convinces him blowing the money on a family trip to Lapland.

There’s just one problem—he finds out there was an mistake with his bonus, which should have been £800, and he has to figure out how to return the excess.

Pleasant yet unmemorable.

Festive score: 🎄🎄

A Classy Netflix Romance

This is one of those Christmas films where the decorations and snow are in the backdrop—Christmas is the environment of the film rather than its main point—but it feels warm and holiday-like all the same.

High-powered businesswoman Sydney (starring Minka Kelly) is assigned to a country estate to negotiate a purchase for a sparkling wine company. During her travels, she encounters a man in a book store who promises to show her a festive Paris.

An expert recently stated this is the best new Christmas film of the past few years. That’s a bit of a stretch, but it is a holiday love story with a dash of elegance and gives the necessary heartwarming sensation.

The scene with a extended debate about Die Hard is particularly strong too.

Holiday verdict: 🎄🎄🎄

A Charming Quest

Teenage Chris, played by Lenny Rush, refuses to stop believing in Father Christmas, in spite of the efforts of his dad (starring James Buckley) to tell him otherwise.

The answer is somewhere, and Chris ventures forth to find it with the expert help of a panel of well-known scientists and personalities.

It’s understated but sweet, and good viewing while waiting for Santa to visit.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄🎄

4.39pm - Oh. What. Fun.

Michelle Pfeiffer is the matriarch of a dysfunctional American family who reunite for the holidays—including other Oscar nominee Felicity Jones, Chloe Grace Moretz, Jason Schwartzman, and dad Denis Leary.

Pfeiffer begins by referencing Christmas classics like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, It’s A Wonderful Life and Home Alone, before stating: “They need to make a movie about the true heroes of the holidays—moms.”

So that’s the concept, but in practice it’s really a jumble of those inspirations, at least until Pfeiffer’s character finally takes center stage.

Christmas tree rating: 🎄🎄

6.43pm - A Scottish Christmas Secret

The day’s gone downhill, but fortunately here’s a new offering in the packed genre of formulaic, schmaltzy, badly acted—and highly entertaining—festive fodder.

It’s a story as well-worn: An American woman journeys to a distant snowy land and ends up stumbling across romance.

In this case, Caprice Bourret plays a publisher